They were right, he did so; and after a few minutes of repose and contemplation, and of tender words to those around him, he started again, and asked for the lawyer. Mr. Robertson came from the library, where he had been sitting, and Harry sent his sisters and his wife away. They were not long shut out from the sick room. The lawyer left the chamber and the house, with a farewell of deep and melancholy sympathy; and for about an hour after, Harry continued conscious of their presence. But this consciousness was broken and disturbed; and afterwards he sank back into a slumbrous, interrupted reverie, from which he never woke again. CHAPTER XIV. ’Tis over--over: here is no present now; All life lies in the past. OLD PLAY. THERE is a deep hush upon Allenders, the silence of death; and quiet footsteps glide about another sick room, passing by the door, where lies one who shall want human tendance never again. Poor little Agnes, worn out and broken, lies there very ill; and they are watching her night and day, as a week ago they watched Harry--but with better hope. And now all the dreary _business_ of this time falls upon Martha. She thinks they will craze her--those necessary directions which she is compelled to give; and Martha cannot afford to risk either her mind or her health for the family’s sake, which now hangs on her hands to be provided for. So the second day after Harry’s death she wrote to Charteris, the only friend, near at hand, to whom she could apply. Martha’s letter was abrupt and short; she could not intimate what had come upon them in many words. “My brother Harry is dead”--this was her letter--“Agnes is ill; and I alone am left to do what this trial requires to be done. You were his friend, and wished him well. Will you come to my aid in this extremity for his sake?” It might have been the letter of a cold heart. Cuthbert knew better than to think it was. And from the window of Agnes’s sick room, Martha, grave and tearless, watched them carry away the dead. There was a long funeral train, for now that he was dead, every one was ready to pay respect to poor Harry. Little Lettie weeping as if her heart would break, had seen the hearse stand at the door; now she grew suddenly still, chill, and full of mysterious terror; and when Mysie lifted her from the window, and softly opened the shutters, letting in the hitherto excluded sunshine, Lettie sat down on the carpet in the light, and shivered and sobbed, but could not weep. They had carried him away--poor Harry! where never mortal ear should hear, or mortal eye look on him again; and Lettie’s little trembling heart was overpowered with irrestrainable longing to see his face; and she could not remember it--could not recal, except in a mist, the features she knew so well.