"Permit me," said I, with kindness, and handed her to a chair. This access of coughing so promptly brought Mrs. Goldsworthy in that I think she must have been listening outside the door. Her caresses and care soothed the young lady, though she lapsed into a flood of nervous tears, and, for a minute or so, withdrew. "Your mistress seems extremely delicate?" I observed. "Yes, poor thing! She will never again be the girl she was." "Are you, may I ask, her mother?" "Her mother? Lawkamercy, no! I ain’t worthy to be more than what I am." "And what is that, my friend?" "Her servant, poor angel! Her mother is, I am sure, in Heaven." "Pardon me. I remember that she told me last night that she was an orphan." "Ay, poor child, a orphan indeed—a orphan of the ’eart," she added, shaking her head, as she became unintentionally poetic. "I fear my visit excites you," said I, moving towards the door, as the young girl reappeared, and seemed to have quite recovered her composure. "Your cough requires the greatest care, and those open windows——" "Oh, I should die without air," she exclaimed, while her eyes sparkled; "for there are times when even my own thoughts seem to stifle me." "La, miss!" said her attendant, warningly, and glancing impatiently at me. "A strange girl," thought I; "but can she be subject to flights of fancy—insane?" "If I can at any time be of service, pray command me, though we shall not be long in Britain now, as we soon start for the Crimea." "Very soon?" she asked, with her eyes and voice full of earnest inquiry. "I cannot say exactly when; but soon, certainly." She pressed her left hand upon her breast, as if to restrain her cough, and cast down her eyelashes. At that moment she seemed remarkably bewitching, soft, modest, and Madonna-like. I was again about to go, and yet stayed, for I longed to learn, at least, her name. "And you go cheerfully forth to face danger and death?" she asked, looking up with a mournful smile in her pleading eyes. "Not cheerfully, for my path is not without its thorns; but for all that I don’t dread death, I hope." "Death!" she said, musingly, as if to herself, while looking at the blood spot on her handkerchief. "Daily I feel myself face to face with him, and shall bid him welcome when he comes nearer, for death has no terrors for me." "Don’t ’ee talk so, darling," said her follower, with a mixture of sorrow and irritation in her manner; "though he you weeps for is a bad ’un at ’art, and I knows it." "Oh, don’t break mine by saying so, nurse." "I trust that you only fancy yourself worse than you really are," said I, with genuine sympathy in my tone and manner. "Remember, the long and sweet season of summer is before us. You are so young, and life must still be full of hope to you." "Hope! oh, no, not of hope! My destiny has already been fulfilled!" she replied, with a strong bitterness of manner; "so hope has done with me."