On the two days following Christmas Day there had been a slight frost.
Then came a harder one; and on this, the fifth day, there was an early
announcement by Simon Devereux and another boy who was of the party at
Thorneybank, that the lake in the grounds would bear.
It was a brilliant, exhilarating day. The frost was hard and the air
keen, but there was not a breath of wind, and the sky was as blue, and
the sun as bright as on a day in June. Mr. Elliott was as eager as the
boys to be on the ice. In all sincerity he observed that in the days of
his youth an English winter had been composed of frosts of the present
delightful nature, and he hurried off to enjoy himself as soon as
breakfast was over. Although refraining from partaking very actively in
the amusements, he remained constantly upon and around the scene.
Towards noon Mrs. Elliott, with Nora, and two other ladies, joined the
party also. Henry was skating when they drew near, but owing to the
suddenness of the frost many persons were unprovided with skates, and he
had already promised to give up his. Shortly after the arrival of Mrs.
Elliott he did so, resigning them for a time to another gentleman. He
came and stood on the banks, and assisted Annabella in her slides.
Nora’s youth had been passed abroad, and since her return to England she
had lived the life of a matron of fifty rather than that of a young
girl. She had never ventured on the ice beyond a few careful steps, and
was nervous at the mere idea of launching herself freely upon it. The
exhilaration of the scene, however, and the pressing entreaties of Mr.
Elliott, at length animating her to overcome her fears, she consented to
be instructed.
The very first rudiments, the suffering herself to be carried down a
slide, had to be taught, and with good-humoured helplessness she put
herself into Mr. Elliott’s hands. He, not Henry, was her instructor.
Henry, as before said, was occupying himself with Annabella.
There was a curve in the lake at the place where they stood, and across
the curve a slide for the children, short and safe, had already been
made. Annabella was tired of it, and was venturing on a longer one, but
on this safe slide Nora began her practice. She went two or three times
slowly and carefully across. Becoming confident, and warmed and
animated, she, after two or three ventures, desirous of shewing her
improvement, and obtaining exercise of a livelier kind, withdrew from
the edge of the bank on the opposite side, and took a run of some yards
before she launched herself on the slide.
The operation was more rapid than she had been prepared for, and she
came to the edge on the further side with a shock so violent that she
lost her balance and her head. She stretched out her arms to recover
herself, catching at she knew not what; but the support she had expected
to find, gave way under her, and she and it fell.
The support was Henry. He had been at the moment, bending forward and
stretching out his hand to a little girl who was in difficulties. He was
not attending to Nora, or conscious of her violent approach, and when
she suddenly grasped him he fell.
Nora rose in an instant, ashamed, but laughing, and not exactly
conscious of what had occurred. But the laugh was over in a moment; for
Henry did not rise; and the next instant there was a scream from
Annabella.
“Oh! Henry, are you hurt?”
A general rush to the spot followed, while Nora stood stupefied with
horror.
He had fallen with his head against a stone, and the blow had been
unbroken by the soft hat he wore. He lay back with an expression of pain
on his face, but pale and motionless.
A plank was procured in a moment from a neighbouring boat-house;
messengers were dispatched for medical advice, and Henry was borne off
to the house.
“How was it?” Mrs. Elliott said to Nora, as they slowly followed. “I did
not see what happened.”
“I did it,” Nora said, forcing out the words. “In saving myself I threw
him down.” She was pale and cold, but quiet.
“I think he is only stunned,” Mrs. Elliott observed compassionately. She
took no special notice of what Nora said. She felt it to be a case in
which words were useless.
Henry was carried to the house, and medical advice was very shortly
procured. But no decisive opinion could be given. He lay during the
whole day speechless and immovable; except, indeed, that one or two
faint moans were heard, and there were once or twice faint movements of
his head. The extent of the injury it was impossible to tell; but the
grave faces betrayed the fears that were entertained.
During that whole day Nora sat in simple endurance like the rest. Had
she not known it before she knew it now, that the life of her life was
threatened; yet she had no rights, no power to say that during these
fleeting moments she would watch over him. She had to endure like the
rest, with only this sad superiority in her case, that she was the cause
of the ill that had befallen.
The human mind can hardly admit of two overpowering sensations, and this
consciousness, “and I the cause,” although it was there, although she
knew the fact, and was made constantly aware of it through the pitying
avoidance of the subject by all about her, was hardly felt. Henry’s life
was trembling in the balance, and she had no power to divert her eyes
from that one consideration. She was to feel it; but it scarcely added
its sting to that day of horror and suspense.
Towards evening there was a slight change. Mrs. Elliott, who alone was
permitted to go near the room, bore the news and made the most of it;
and before the general separation for the night, she was able to give a
yet more favourable report. Henry had moved and spoken. There might be
other dangers--there was a fear of fever; but the first worst fear that
he never would speak again was at an end. And the first relief from
dread, however qualified by other fear, was what no words can express,
or comparison describe.