in his right mind, and, in much alarm, sent for a physician.
The doctor looked grave on seeing the sick min, and said that he was threatened with typhoid fever, and the words struck a cold terror into the heart of Rosaline Nichols.
Two weeks had passed, passed amid fluctuations of hope and fear, such as the anxious watchers by the bedside of that terrible fever can best understand. For most of the time, Mr. Nichols seemed in a state of stupor, although he had occasional seasons of wakefulness, and rare lucid intervals. His wife had watched most tenderly over him night and day, until the bloom had left her check, and the light was quenched in her blue eyes.
Memory and remorse had been very busy in the heart of the young wife, and she had made many blessed resolves for the time when Hugh should be well again: and then, once in a while, a thought would rush across her soul, a thought »o terrible that it seemed to palsy both heart and brain, and she would moan out wildly, “Oh! God, not that—spare him! spare him!”
But at the end of two weeks there was no abatement of the fever, and all perceived, what the young woman would not admit, that the suf¬ ferer was rapidly failing. A consultation of doctors was held that evening: and when they had all left, the old family physician sent for Mrs. Nichols to tell her the result.
She entered the room with so much eager anxiety in her eyes, and with such a worn, white face, and the bright golden hair put away in heavy wrinkles from the smooth forehead, that, looking on her, the old man was strangely touched.
“Now, doctor, what do they all think of my husband—that he will be better very soon?” She asked the question with touching childish eagerness.
“My dear child,” said the old man, “it grieves my heart to tell you; but—”
She understood him, and a shriek burst from her lips that rang through the house, and stirred the stupor of the dying man; then she stood still, white and paralyzed.
“Oh! Hugh, I can’t let you go, I can’t!” murmured the stricken wife, as, an hour later, she stood by her husband’s bedside. “You’ve been such a good, kind, tender husband to me; you've petted, and watched over, and cared for my lightest wish: and how can I live without you now? Do get well, Hugh, so that I can show you how sorry I am that I’ve not made a better wife; that I’ve been so careless, and cruel, and so indifferent to all your kindness. Oh! Hugh, don’t die and leave your Rosie!” and so, parting away the damp hair in his dying hour, as she had never done in his living ones, Rosaline Nichols made her cry over her husband. Alas! alas! how many such vain cries have been made over dying bedsides; but the guest that, sooner or later, crosses every threshold, was entering, and all his wealth would not buy back one hour of life to Hugh Nichols.
Once he opened his eyes, and smiled faintly on his wife. She put her arms around his neck, and begged him not to leave her, with words that showered the cheeks of every listener with tears. A look of agony came over his face; and the clergyman, who stood by, bowed himself in prayer, and the dying man’s eyes softened as he heard Mm, and there was faith and hope in his face, as he looked upward; but just as the prayer closed, the soul of Hugh Nichols went down to the river—the river where all life flows unto death. Oh! blessed be God, the river over which all true life passes to the shores of eternal rest.
A year and a half had passed. It was a beautiful evening in the early May. The stars filled the sky with their illuminated lettering, and the young moon laid her golden sickle on the azure sky. The apple trees, clothed with white blossoms, looked like tents pitched in the distance, and the winds sent up sweet, fresh fragrance from the woods. Mrs. Nichols’ parlor was lighted that evening almost for the first time since her husband’s death, and on a divan in one of the alcoves, sat Ruel Wylie and Mrs. Nichols. She looked very beautiful in her half mourning, and there was a soft flush on the lady’s cheek that reminded her companion of the days of his early wooing: and although nine years lay between that time and this, the bloom there now was fair as it was then.
“How beautiful the moon is tonight! and she looks in upon us with her old smile. Ah! Rosaline, have you forgotten that night under the willow?”
“I have not forgotten it,” echoed the soft, fluttering voice of the lady.
“And now, Rosaline, my heart must speak the secret it has held so long and heavily. Believe me, that young love was the love of my life, and though I have met many women, beautiful, accomplished and high-born, yet none of them has ever taken the place of the little girl who laid her golden head on my breast under the apple boughs that night. And, Rosaline, tell me if this long, silent affection does not now deserve some recompense?”
And so with such tender, poetic words, as ever win the hearts of the daughters of men, he won
