Meanwhile, Janetta, watching by the bedside of Rachel Dane, did not
like the looks of her patient.
The woman had been very bad from the first, her body covered with
bruises, and complaining of severe inward pains that indicated internal
injuries.
All that medical skill could do, combined with careful nursing, had
been lavished on the sufferer; but it was quite evident that her days
were numbered.
To-day she was restless and querulous, sliding down in bed, and picking
at the covers in an ominous way.
“Where is my mistress?” she inquired, presently: adding in a fretful
tone; “she has entirely neglected me to-day.”
Janetta soothingly made excuses for Mrs. Flint, saying that her niece
had arrived that morning, and they had been together in the room of Mr.
Dawn, who was not expected to live long.
“I should like to see Miss Dawn,” Rachel Dane muttered, curiously.
“That would be impossible, for the young lady was quite prostrated by
the excitement in her father’s room, and was carried to bed just now,
with the doctor in attendance,” replied Janetta.
Rachel Dane kept silence quite a little while, then she sharply ordered
Janetta to go away and send Mrs. Flint.
The maid obeyed, only too glad to get away from the grewsome company of
the dying woman.
Mrs. Flint came at once, wan and weary from excitement, but full of
kindly sympathy.
“Rachel, I am sorry to see that you are not so well to-day,” she said.
“So you can see it? Well, I felt it myself; that’s why I wanted you. I
knew you would tell me the truth. Am I going to die?” querulously.
Mrs. Flint had been by many a death-bed, and she saw the signs here, so
she answered, frankly:
“Rachel, I don’t want to frighten you, but it’s time you should make
your peace with God.”
The poor wretch shuddered and moaned:
“Are you sure? Did the doctor say so, ma’am?”
“He has never had any hope of your recovery, Rachel, and you are
failing fast to-day. You will soon be done with this world; but, alas!
you are not ready for the next one.”
She did not want to frighten the parting soul but she was sorrowful
over the life going out into eternal darkness.
Rachel Dane shuddered, and cried:
“I always meant to get ready when the time came but it caught me
unprepared. I’m only fifty odd years old, and I hoped to live to
ninety. Oh, tell me what to do! help me, pray for me!”
“I’ve prayed for you, Rachel Dane, ever since you made your home under
my roof, and I’m glad your heart is softened at last. Try to love God
and believe in His goodness. Say after me: ‘Lord, forgive a dying
sinner, and save me, for Christ’s sake! Amen.’”
The dying creature clutched at the bed-clothes, and mumbled the words
in pitiful earnest, after which Mrs. Flint knelt by the bed, and
herself offered up a fervent prayer.
“Oh, I’ve been bad and wicked all my life, hating God because I was
poor! I don’t know how to get His favor now,” sighed the dying sinner;
and Mrs. Flint answered, soothingly:
“If you have done anything wicked that you can undo, now is the time to
repent and get God’s forgiveness.”
She saw a look of alarm come into the fading eyes, and Rachel plucked
wildly at the counterpane, muttering:
“I did a cruel wrong twenty years ago. I stole the baby daughter of a
heart-broken young widow.”
“Good heavens! how dreadful! Tell me all about it quickly, and perhaps
something may yet be done to right the wrong,” cried Mrs. Flint, in
dismay.
But at that moment they were interrupted by the opening of the door,
and Madame Ray glided in, murmuring in her sweet, soft voice:
“They told me you were watching by a very sick woman, and as Cinthia is
asleep, I thought I might be of some assistance to you.”
She had never heard the name of Rachel Dane, and she came and stood by
the bed, looking down, with pity and sympathy, at the poor soul.
Rachel Dane turned her heavy eyes upward to the lovely face, and then
uttered a cry of deadly fear:
“My God! it is Mrs. Ray, come to haunt me in my dying hour!”
“Rachel Dane, where is my child, my baby daughter?” cried the other,
wildly; and, shaking with excitement, she added: “Do not die,
miserable wretch, till you reveal the truth.”
Mrs. Flint stared in wonder, and exclaimed:
“The poor woman was just confessing to me that she had stolen a young
widow’s child twenty years ago. Go on with your story, Rachel.”
She pushed the agitated lady into a chair as she spoke, and waited with
eager curiosity and sympathy for the next words.
Rachel looked fearfully at the woman she had wronged, and muttered:
“Do not look so wretched, lady, for all is well with your daughter, and
she shall be restored to your arms.”
“Thank God--thank God!” cried the mother, with a rush of glad tears.
“So it was Madame Ray’s child that you stole, Rachel? But why did you
do such a wicked thing?” cried her mistress.
“Oh, Mrs. Flint, it was for the greed of gold, that has always cursed
my life--the longing for gold and pleasure! A beautiful woman came to
me, and said: ‘I have been married two years, and I have no child. My
husband will never love me till I give him an heir. I would like a
little girl because his first wife had a boy, and I hate it. Find me a
pretty baby, and help me to impose it on him as my own when he returns
from his long journey, and you shall live with me, and I will make you
rich.’ Wretch that I was, I stole Mrs. Ray’s sweet baby, and helped the
other woman to fool her husband. She paid me well; but growing weary
of my extortions after two years, she and her husband stole away North,
where I could never trace them, till one night I saw him on the train
and followed him, only to find that his wife had died years before.”
“But my child, my darling, where is she?” sobbed the eager mother.
“Where is the child?” echoed Mrs. Flint, suspiciously, and Rachel Dane
answered, gladly:
“Oh, how glad I am to restore her safe to her mother’s arms! She is
here with you, Mrs. Flint--the girl called Cinthia Dawn, but no kin of
yours, for she is the baby I stole for Mrs. Dawn, the unloved wife--the
child of Mrs. Richard Ray, and may Heaven forgive my sin!”