Watkins indeed presently came in and reported as much,
and that the wind was changing and it was coming off
cold; and then his heavy boots were heard going up
the stairs to his room overhead; but Fleda listened
in vain for the sound of the latch of her grandfather’s
door, or aunt Miriam’s quiet foot-fall in the
passage; listened and longed, till the minutes seemed
like the links of a heavy chain which she was obliged
to pass over from hand to hand, and the last link
could not be found. The noise of Watkins’
feet ceased overhead, and nothing stirred or moved
but the crackling flames and Cynthia’s elbows,
which took turns each in resting upon the opposite
arm, and now and then a tell-tale gust of wind in the
trees. If Mr. Ringgan was asleep, why did not
aunt Miriam come out and see them,—if he
was better, why not come and tell them so. He
had been asleep when she first went into his room,
and she had come back for a minute then to try again
to get Fleda to bed; why could she not come out for
a minute once more. Two hours of watching and
trouble had quite changed little Fleda; the dark ring
of anxiety had come under each eye in her little pale
face; she looked herself almost ill.
Aunt Miriam’s grave step was heard coming out
of the room at last,—it did not sound cheerfully
in Fleda’s ears. She came in, and stopping
to give some direction to Cynthy, walked up to Fleda.
Her face encouraged no questions. She took the
child’s head tenderly in both her hands, and
told her gently, but it was in vain that she tried
to make her voice quite as usual, that she had better
go to bed—that she would be sick.
Fleda looked up anxiously in her face.
“How is he?”
But her next word was the wailing cry of sorrow,—“Oh
grandpa!—”
The old lady took the little child in her arms and
they both sat there by the fire until the morning
dawned.
Chapter VIII.
Patience
and sorrow strove
Who should express her goodliest.
King Lear.
When Mr. Carleton knocked at the front door the next
day about two o’clock it was opened to him by
Cynthy. He asked for his late host.
“Mr. Ringgan is dead.”
“Dead!” exclaimed the young man much shocked;—“when?
how?”
“Won’t you come in, sir?” said Cynthy;—“maybe
you’ll see Mis’ Plumfield.”
“No, certainly,” replied the visitor.
“Only tell me about Mr. Ringgan.”
“He died last night.”
“What was the matter with him?”
“I don’t know,” said Cynthy in a
business-like tone of voice,—“I s’pose
the doctor knows, but he didn’t say nothing about
it. He died very sudden.”
