“But why, mamma?  As we cannot go to England what good will it do us just to see him for a moment?”

“I cannot go to England, but there is nothing to prevent you from doing so.”

“Oh, dear, that old idea still!  It is quite useless, mamma.  You shall not send me away from you.”

Lucia knelt by her mother’s side, and looked up into her face with eyes full of mingled entreaty and resolution.  Mrs. Costello drew her close within her arm.

“No, my darling.  I have given up that idea altogether.  Indeed, there is no longer any need for it, and I should grudge losing you out of my sight for a single day now.  But, don’t you understand that a time may be coming when we shall have to part, whether we will or no?”

“Ah! not yet.  There is plenty of time to think of that.”

“Perhaps.  But I doubt it.  At any rate I have less reason than most people to count on long life.”

Again Lucia looked up.  A cold, unspeakable terror filled her heart, and she tried to read the secret which her mother’s calm face hid from her.  Mrs. Costello delayed no longer to tell her all the truth.

“Many months ago,” she said, “I was convinced that the disease of which my mother died, had attacked me.  I suppose there might be some hereditary predisposition towards it, and too much thought and care brought it on.  I determined not to allow myself any fancies on the subject.  I sent for Doctor Hardy, and contrived to see him several times during the autumn without letting you suspect anything.  He could only acknowledge that I was right, and tell me to avoid excitement and fatigue.  You know how possible that was.  And so this mischief has been going on fast, and the end may be nearer than even I think it is.”

Her voice faltered at the last words, and Lucia, who had listened to every one with the feeling that so many knives were being plunged through and through her heart, slipped down from her resting-place, and crouched on the floor, hiding her face and stifling the sobs that shook her whole body.  She longed to cry out, to clasp her arms round her mother, to struggle, with all the force of her great love, against this fate; and yet, so well had she understood, so clearly she remembered, even through her agony, the need for quietness, that she kept a force upon herself like iron, trying to steady the pulses that throbbed so wildly, with one thought, or rather one impulse, “I must not trouble her.”

Mrs. Costello looked at her child for a moment in silence.  Even she did not yet fully understand the force of that quality which Lucia herself had once ascribed to her Indian blood, but which, in truth, had little affinity with common fortitude, for it was simply a conquest of self, gained without thought or conscious effort, by the greater power of love.  But such contests cannot last long.  This was fierce and cruel, but it ended as love willed.  The poor child dragged herself up again to her mother’s knee, and drew the pale, fair face down to her own flushed and burning one; but one kiss, silent and full of anguish, was all that she dared venture yet.  But she longed to hear more, and presently Mrs. Costello spoke again, not daring yet to go back to the point of which they had last spoken, but returning to the subject of their journey.