East of the Shadows

"Didn't he know his mother?"

The doctor shrugged his shoulders. "Who can tell? He never appeared to. He was just the same to her as he was to any one else who entered his room--quite polite, but glad when they went away."

"How awful for her!" cried Philippa.

"Yes, it was awful. She was a wonderful woman--one of the old type. She had no notion of admitting the outside world into her affairs, or of discussing her inmost feelings with any one. A woman of dauntless courage, old Lady Louisa; and if some people thought her hard it was not to be wondered at; she was a bit hard, but it was merely a sort of armour she put on in self-defence. She fought every inch of the way--every inch. She never lost patience, even after hope was gone. Everything she could think of she did, trying endless devices to interest and amuse him--for years Francis drove with her every day. And finally she accepted the truth with the same courage with which she had fought against it--the courage that knows when it is beaten--and ceased to try and rouse him. He hasn't been outside his room for years now. Many people don't know he lives here--new-comers to the place, I mean; for the older folk in the village, who reverenced Lady Louisa and loved him, respected her wishes too much to chatter. Which is saying a good deal, isn't it? For it takes a good bit to stay a gossip's tongue. But her will was law in the place, and I never heard of any one attempting to dispute it. I know she suffered agonies of mind, but I never knew her break down until just at the last, when she was dying. She kept death at bay by sheer strength of will for weeks, simply because she couldn't bear to leave him. He was her only son--her only child. And her last words were, 'Let him come soon, O God; let him come soon.' Go and look at her grave and read the inscription she wrote out herself for it. Poor Lady Louisa! and poor Francis!"

"Did you know my father?" asked the girl after a while.

"Yes; I knew him, but not so well as I knew your aunt. I was a good deal away after my boyhood, and my holidays later on did not always coincide with his visits here, but I met him several times."

"He never spoke to me of his sister."

"That I can understand. It is only what I should have expected. I happened to see your father, Miss Harford, as he left this house when he came here after the accident. He had seen his sister, he had failed in his efforts to persuade her, all his arguments had been of no avail, and his distress was beyond all words. He had loved Francis Heathcote--he was his most intimate friend--and he had adored his sister. Up to that time I think he had firmly believed that she could do no wrong. And then, to find that under stress of trouble she had failed so grievously nearly broke his heart. And yet"--the doctor spoke slowly and thoughtfully--"yet--I think still as I thought then, and as I told him that day, that she should not be too greatly blamed."