Pray, madam,
let me just have one sight of her. I will not ask for more."
But he did ask for more after he had had his wish. He stole upstairs
after Miss Monro, who looked round reproachfully at him if even a
nightingale sang, or an owl hooted in the trees outside the open windows,
yet who paused to say herself, outside Mr. Wilkins's chamber door,
"Her father's room; he has not been in bed for six nights, till to-night;
pray do not make a noise to waken him." And on into the deep stillness
of the hushed room, where one clear ray of hidden lamp-light shot athwart
the door, where a watcher, breathing softly, sat beside the bed--where
Ellinor's dark head lay motionless on the white pillow, her face almost
as white, her form almost as still. You might have heard a pin fall.
After a while he moved to withdraw. Miss Monro, jealous of every sound,
followed him, with steps all the more heavy because they were taken with
so much care, down the stairs, back into the drawing-room. By the bed-
candle flaring in the draught, she saw that there was the glittering mark
of wet tears on his cheek; and she felt, as she said afterwards, "sorry
for the young man." And yet she urged him to go, for she knew that she
might be wanted upstairs. He took her hand, and wrung it hard.
"Thank you. She looked so changed--oh! she looked as though she were
dead.
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