A faint sound roused her from this preoccupation. She turned her head. Oh, what was it she saw? The lady of Johnny’s dream had come in while Rosalind had forgotten her watch, and stood looking at him in his little bed. Rosalind’s lips opened to cry out, but the cry seemed stifled in her throat. The spectre, if it were a spectre, half raised the veil that hung about her head and gazed at the child, stooping forward, her hands holding the lace in such an attitude that she seemed to bless him as he lay--a tall figure, all black save for the whiteness of the half-seen face. Rosalind had risen noiselessly from her chair; she gazed too as if her eyes would come out of their sockets, but she was behind the curtain and unseen. Whether it was that her presence diffused some sense of protection round, or that the child was in a more profound sleep than usual, it was impossible to tell, but Johnny never moved, and his visitor stood bending towards him without a breath or sound. Rosalind, paralyzed in body, overwhelmed in her mind with terror, wonder, confusion, stood and looked on with sensations beyond description, as if her whole soul was suspended on the event. Had any one been there to see, the dark room, with the two ghostly, silent figures in it, noiseless, absorbed, one watching the other, would have been the strangest sight. But Rosalind was conscious of nothing save of life suspended, hanging upon the next movement or sound, and never knew how long it was that she stood, all power gone from her, watching, scarcely breathing, unable to speak or think. Then the dark figure turned, and there seemed to breathe into the air something like a sigh. It was the only sound; not even the softest footfall on the carpet or rustle of garments seemed to accompany her movements, slow and reluctant, towards the doorway. Then she seemed to pause again on the threshold between the two rooms, within sight of the bed in which Amy lay. Rosalind followed, feeling herself drawn along by a power not her own, herself as noiseless as a ghost. The strain upon her was so intense that she was incapable of feeling, and stood mechanically, her eyes fixed, her heart now fluttering wildly, now standing still altogether. The moment came, however, when this tension was too much. Beyond the dark figure in the doorway she saw, or thought she saw, Amy’s eyes, wild and wide open, appealing to her from the bed. Her little sister’s anguish of terror and appeal for help broke the spell and made Rosalind’s suspense intolerable. She made a wild rush forward, her frozen voice broke forth in a hoarse cry. She put out her hands and grasped or tried to grasp the draperies of the mysterious figure; then, as they escaped her, fell helpless, blind, unable to sustain herself, but not unconscious, by Amy’s bed, upon the floor. CHAPTER XLVIII.