Page:Ethel Churchill 1.pdf/33

Rh Something in the face suddenly struck you as unaccustomed, for you were terrified, and looked imploringly towards me for aid. "I turned to the aged nurse, but she was lying back in a deep-cushioned easy chair, overpowered with weariness and heavy sleep. "Again Lady Meredith raised her head from the pillow, and a sudden and unnatural light flashed from her drooping eye-lids. "'I know you, Jasper,' said she, in a faint and sepulchral voice. 'It had been hard for me to die without your forgiveness. You are looking kindly and sadly on me: look ever thus, I pray you, on my poor and orphan child, who can claim no friend upon the earth, except yourself.' I raised you, pale, pretty creature that you were, from the bed, and you clung about my neck. 'Yes, she will love you!' murmured the sufferer, yet more feebly; and, at the next effort to ejaculate, her accents died away with a frightful gurgling in the throat. "She stretched her hands convulsively—a rapid change passed over her features—I looked upon the face of the dead!"