Lady Emily was still in bed, but apparently more sick in mind than in
body. She said she had tossed about all the previous night without once
falling asleep; and her maid, who had slept in the dressing-room without
waking once, corroborated the assertion. In the morning, Mrs. Elton,
wishing to relieve the maid, sent Margaret to Lady Emily. Margaret
arranged the bedclothes and pillows, which were in a very uncomfortable
condition, sat down behind the curtain; and, knowing that it would please
Lady Emily, began to sing, in what the French call a veiled voice, The
Land o’ the Leal. Now the air of this lovely song is the same as that of
Scots wha hae; but it is the pibroch of onset changed into the coronach of
repose, singing of the land beyond the battle, of the entering in of those
who have fought the good fight, and fallen in the field. It is the silence
after the thunder. Before she had finished, Lady Emily was fast asleep. A
sweet peaceful half smile lighted her troubled face graciously, like the
sunshine that creeps out when it can, amidst the rain of an autumn day,
saying, “I am with you still, though we are all troubled.” Finding her
thus at rest, Margaret left the room for a minute, to fetch some work.
When she returned, she found her tossing, and moaning, and apparently on
the point of waking. As soon as she sat down by her, her trouble
diminished by degrees, till she lay in the same peaceful sleep as before.
In this state she continued for two or three hours, and awoke much
refreshed. She held out her little hand to Margaret, and said:
“Thank you. Thank you. What a sweet creature you are!”
And Lady Emily lay and gazed in loving admiration at the face of the
lady’s-maid.
“Shall I send Sarah to you now, my lady?” said Margaret; “or would you
like me to stay with you?”
“Oh! you, you, please—if Mrs. Elton can spare you.”
“She will only think of your comfort, I know, my lady.”
“That recalls me to my duty, and makes me think of her.”
“But your comfort will be more to her than anything else.”
“In that case you must stay, Margaret.”
“With pleasure, my lady.”
Mrs. Elton entered, and quite confirmed what Margaret had said.
“But,” she added, “it is time Lady Emily had something to eat. Go to the
cook, Margaret, and see if the beef-tea Miss Cameron ordered is ready.”
Margaret went.
“What a comfort it is,” said Mrs. Elton, wishing to interest Lady Emily,
“that now-a-days, when infidelity is so rampant, such corroborations of
Sacred Writ are springing up on all sides! There are the discoveries at
Nineveh; and now these Spiritual Manifestations, which bear witness so
clearly to another world.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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