I think he has looked Death in the face, as nearly
as any one ever did without falling utterly into his
cold embrace, but he pulls through.
By very slow, small, and faltering steps, he creeps
back to convalescence. His recovery is a tedious
business, with many tiresome checks, and many ebbings
and flowings of the tide of life; but—he
lives. Weak as any little tottering child—white
as the sheets he lies on; with prominent cheek-bones,
and great and languid eyes, he is given back to us.
Life, worsted daily in a thousand cruel fights, has
gained one little victory. To-day, for the first
time, we all three at once leave him— leave
him coolly and quietly asleep, and dine together in
Mrs. Huntley’s little dusk-shaded dining-room.
We are quite a party. Mother is here, come to
rejoice over her restored first-born son; the Brat
is here; he has run over from Oxford. Musgrave
is here. I am in such spirits; I do not know what
has come to me. It seems to me as if I were newly
born into a fresh and altogether good and jovial world.
Not even the presence of Musgrave lays any constraint
upon my spirits.
For the first time since the dark day in Brindley
Wood, I meet him without embarrassment. I answer
him: I even address him now and then.
All the small civilizations of life—the
flower-garnished table; the lamps softly burning;
the evening-dresses (for the first time we have dressed
for dinner)—fill me with a keen pleasure,
that I should have thought such little etceteras were
quite incapable of affording.
I seem as if I could not speak without broad smiles.
I am tired, indeed, still, and my eyes are heavy.
But what does that matter? Life has won!
Life has won! We are still all six here!
“Nancy!” says the Brat, regarding me with
an eye of friendly criticism, “I think you are
cracked to-night!—Do you remember
what our nurses used to tell us? Much laughing
always ends in much crying.”
But I do not heed: I laugh on. Barbara is
not nearly so boisterously merry as I, but then she
never is. She is more overdone with fatigue than
I, I think; for she speaks little—though
what she does say is full of content and gladness—and
there are dark streaks of weariness and watching under
the serene violets of her eyes. She is certainly
very tired; as we go to bed at night she seems hardly
able to get up the stairs, but leans heavily on the
banisters—one who usually runs so lightly
up and down.
Yes, very tired, but what of that? it would
be unnatural, most unnatural if she were not;
she will be all right to-morrow, after a good long
night’s rest—yes, all right.
I say this to her, still gayly laughing as I give
her my last kiss, and she smiles and echoes, “All
right!”
“So mayst thou die, as I do; fear
and pain
Being subdued. Farewell! Farewell!
Farewell!”
