Great Britain -- History -- Civil War, 1642-1649 -- Fiction
Although Molly asked oftenest for the tale of the damsel who came alive
again at the word of the man who knew all about death, she did not limit
her desires to the repetition of what she knew already; and in order to
keep his treasure supplied with things new as well as old, the marquis
went the oftener to his Latin bible to refresh his memory for Molly's
use, and was in both ways, in receiving and in giving, a gainer. When
the old man came thus to pour out his wealth to the child, lady Margaret
then first became aware what a depth both of religious knowledge and
feeling there was in her father-in-law. Neither sir Toby Mathews, nor
Dr. Bayly, who also visited her at times, ever, with the torch of their
talk, lighted the lamps behind those great eyes, whose glass was growing
dull with the vapours from the grave; but her grandfather's voice, the
moment he began to speak to her of the good Jesu, brought her soul to
its windows.
This sultry evening Molly was restless. 'Madam! madam!' she kept calling
to her mother--for, like so many of such children, her manners and modes
of speech resembled those of grown people, 'What wouldst thou, chicken?'
her mother would ask. 'Madam, I know not,' the child would answer.
Twenty times in an hour, as the evening went on, almost the same words
would pass between them. At length, once more, 'Madam! madam!' cried the
child. 'What would my heart's treasure?' said the mother; and Molly
answered, 'Madam, I would see the white horse spout.'
With a glance and sign to her mistress. Dorothy rose and crept from the
room, crossed the court and the moat, and dragged her heavy heart up the
long stair to the top of the keep. Arrived there, she looked down
through a battlement, and fixed her eyes on a certain window, whence
presently she caught the wave of a signal-handkerchief.
At the open window stood lady Margaret with Molly in her arms. The night
was so warm that the child could take no hurt; and indeed what could
hurt her, with the nameless fever-moth within, fretting a passage for
the new winged body which, in the pains of a second birth, struggled to
break from its dying chrysalis.
'Now, Molly, tell the horse to spout,' said lady Margaret, with such
well-simulated cheerfulness as only mothers can put on with hearts ready
to break.
'Mother Mary, tell the horse to spout,' said Molly; and up went the
watery parabolas.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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