Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/487

 480 the image of her pale excited face and pleading eyes seemed before him, and he felt that the actual sight would grieve him more than he liked to acknowledge. He set off with a brisk step and a blithe whistle; but before he had gone far, he stopped and looked back. There she still stood, her head bent down, her hands clasped, as his fancy had vividly pictured her: still as death.

“Coral!” he called out.

She looked up with a start.

“I have told Nelly what a great princess you are going to be, and I think she’ll never survive her astonishment.”

She made no answer, looked down again, and when she did look up for a moment, he was gone. Pressing her hands wildly on her heart, she threw herself on the ground, and burst into a convulsion of weeping.

She had often felt that while Keefe was all the world to her, she was only the plaything of an idle hour to him, but this conviction had never before been forced upon her so painfully. She had loved him without a hope or an object; to love him had been a delight, a necessity, that asked no return, no reward, and as long as she could be near him, and sometimes receive a pleased smile, a kind word, or a cordial grasp of his hand, she had been content. At times she had felt his careless indifference bitter; but the worst pang it had ever caused her was light compared with the agony of leaving him for ever. She said to herself that if she might only remain where she could sometimes see him, she would have asked nothing more, though he never bestowed on her a glance or a word. Wild denizen of the woods though she was, she had now no regrets to spare for the freedom she was going to lose, no terror at the thought of going among strangers and aliens—she only felt and knew one thing—she was going to leave Keefe, going to leave sun and stars, light and life! No wonder that she wept till she could weep no more. The sun’s last rays glittered on the stream, the trees were flooded with gold, the sky grew rosy-red, the birds sang their evening hymns in the forest coverts, but she saw no brightness in the air, heard no music in the voices of the birds, and the merry sound of the brook seemed to her ear a mournful dirge. Taking the braid of hair off her fingers, she tore it into fragments, and scattered it on the ground. The little birds that were still twittering round her pecked eagerly at the pieces as she threw them from her; she watched them apathetically at first, and then mechanically felt in her pocket, and taking out some bread that still remained there, crumbled it among them. At sight of the eager joy with which the hungry little creatures devoured every mite, her heart softened, and though her lip quivered, and her smile was sadder than tears, her pain seemed to grow less bitter.

“Poor little things,” she said, mournfully, “I can make you happy yet.”

Soon the sun’s setting splendours vanished, and every bright tint died away; the birds ceased their songs and nestled to sleep among the leaves; the last little brown-bird had eaten the last crumb and flown away, but poor Coral sat still. The grey twilight, the brown shadows creeping round the trees seemed to partake of a sad life kindred to her own; the light winds softly sighing among the boughs, the flow of water muffled by the long grass and fern sounded soothingly in her ears; the cold dew felt like balm on her hot brow; night, pale and clouded, seemed to have veiled her bright stars in pity for the wounded heart, now bleeding beneath her quiet canopy; and thus Nature’s gentle influences soothed and comforted her, to whom no other comfort was given.

the varying moods of gaiety and pensiveness, so sweet in their manifestations, which had thrown such a charm round Coral, were all merged in stillness and gloom. The child of impulse and feeling, she gave way to the sorrow that overwhelmed her without a struggle. Keefe saw her grief, and though he tried to hide the truth from himself, he could not remain quite ignorant of its cause. But he little guessed how strong and lasting her feelings were.

“He jests at scars who never felt the wound!” and Keefe assured himself that when once Coral was with her father, new scenes and circumstances would restore her to her former light-heartedness; he could not see that his image was graven so deeply on her heart, that no influence of time or change could ever efface it.

A few days before she left Long Arrow her pet squirrel drooped, and died without any apparent cause, and Keefe found her sitting near Brady’s barn, holding her dead favourite in her lap.

“Is Skif dead?” he asked. “Poor little fellow, I’m sorry for him.”

“I’m very glad,” said Coral, bitterly; “it’s better for him. He won’t be taken from his own free woods; he’ll be in the sweet, fresh earth, and the green moss will cover him lightly. It’s better for him than for me; it would be better for me also to die now, and sleep under the trees with Skif.”

Keefe endeavoured as well as he could to soothe her grief, and give her hope and interest in her future life; trying to awaken her sympathy for her father, and painting her new home and its pleasures in the brightest and most attractive colours his fancy could command.

She listened to him quietly, but like the wounded eagle—

Her looks betrayed

The unaltered anguish of her heart.

Yet she never dreamed of resisting Keefe’s decision; she loved him so truly, she must obey him.

In the meantime, Mrs. Brady expatiated day after day on the great luck and good fortune that had happened to the child, and the grand lady she was going to be, with the best of beef and wine to eat and drink, and the finest of silks and diamonds to wear, like Cinderella in the story book, and elegant music and dancing to please her fancy, and no end of servants to wait upon her from morning till night; and much Nelly marvelled at the dullness and want of feeling which could remain indifferent to such magnificent prospects. She forgot not to intersperse the harangues which she poured into the regardless ears of the young girl, with mysterious allusions to Denis,