A bankrupt heart, Vol. 2 (of 3)

For seven weeks Nell Llewellyn fluctuated between life and death before she was fully roused again to a sense of living and its cares and responsibilities. It was on a sunny afternoon, in the middle of October, that she first awoke to the consciousness that she was herself. But she was too weak to do more than be aware of it. The afternoon sun was glinting through the white blind of her bedroom window, and a little breeze caused it to flap gently against the latticed panes. Nell lay on her bed, as weak and unreasoning and incurious as a little child, and watched the tassel of the blind bobbing up and down, without questioning why she lay there, unable to move or think. An old woman named Betsy Hobbs, who came in sometimes to help in an emergency at the farmhouse, was seated by the window, with a large pair of knitting-needles in her hands, a ball of worsted at her feet, and her head sunk on her breast, enjoying a snooze after the labours of the day. Nell stared at her unfamiliar figure with the same sense of incapacity to understand her presence, and the same sense of utter indifference to not understanding it. Her feeble sight roved over everything in the room with the same apathy. The coverlet on her bed was a coloured one, and she kept on counting the squares and wondering in a vague manner why one should be red and the next blue. One red, and the next blue--one red, and the next blue--she kept on mentally repeating to herself, until her eyes had travelled to the foot of the bed, over the footboard of which was thrown a pink knitted shawl, or kerchief, which her mother had bought for her just before she was taken ill, and which she had worn around her shoulders on the evening she had gone to hear Hugh Owen preach in the field. That little link between the past and the present recalled it all. In a moment she comprehended. She was no longer happy, innocent Nell Llewellyn, spending her young life at Panty-cuckoo Farm, but the disgraced and degraded daughter of the house, who had crept home, a living lie, to hide her shame and sorrow in her mother’s bosom. The remembrance brought with it but one desire--one want--which expressed itself in a feeble cry of ‘Mother!’ At least, it was what Nell intended for a cry; but her voice was so faint and weak, that Betsy Hobbs only roused from her nap with a feeling of curiosity if she had heard anything. She was accustomed to nursing the sick, however, and was a light sleeper, so she hobbled up to the bedside and peered into her patient’s face. Sure enough her eyes were open and there was reason in them.

‘Praise the Lord, dearie,’ she ejaculated, ‘you’re yourself agin at last!’

But Nell turned her face to the wall with the same cry of ‘Mother!’

‘To be sure, dearie; and I’ll fetch ’er in ’alf a minnit. She’s only stepped down to the dairy to see ’ow things are goin’ on, for business ’as been sadly neglected of late. Night and day--night and day--the pore dear’s bin by your side, longin’ to ’ear your own voice agin, and she’ll be overj’yed to find you in your senses. Come, drink a drop o’ milk, do, and then I’ll fetch ’er.’

But Nell turned fractiously from the proffered cup and reiterated her cry for her mother. She was gaunt and emaciated to a degree. The cruel fever had wasted her rounded limbs, and dug deep furrows beneath her eyes, and turned her delicate complexion to yellow and brown. She looked like a woman of forty or fifty, instead of a girl of three-and-twenty. As the old woman ambled out of the room, Nell raised her thin hands and gazed at the white nails and bony knuckles with amazement. Where had she been? What had happened to her, to alter her like that? Her questions were answered by the entrance of Mrs Llewellyn.

‘Oh, my dear lass--my own poor lamb!’ she exclaimed, as she came hurriedly to the bedside, and folded her daughter in her arms. ‘Praise the Lord that you have taken a turn at last! I’ve been watching for this days and days, till I began to fear it might never be. You’ve been main ill, my girl, and all the house nursing you through it. Father’s lying down on his bed. He hasn’t had his coat off for three nights. But you’re better, my lass, you’re better, thank God for that!’

‘How long have I been ill?’ asked Nell in a faint voice.

‘Better than six weeks--going on for seven,’ replied her mother; ‘and it’s been an anxious time for all of us. I thought poor Hetty would have cried herself sick last week, when Dr Cowell told us we mustn’t build our hopes too much on keeping you here. I think he will be as surprised as anyone when he hears the good news. Oh, my lass, it would have been a sore day for more than one of us if we had lost you!’

‘I may go yet, mother,’ said Nell, looking at her skeleton hands; ‘there’s not much of me left, I’m thinking.’

‘Oh, no you won’t, my dear, not this time, thank God. I know what these fevers are. I’ve seen too many of them. When they’ve burnt themselves out, they’re over. And you’re as cool as a cucumber now. You feel terrible weak, I know, but good feeding and care will soon set you up again.’

‘What a trouble I must have been to you,’ sighed Nell wearily; ‘and so unworthy of it too. Mother, why didn’t you let me die, and make an end of it? Life is not worth living at any time, and I’ve seen the best of mine.’

‘Nonsense, my girl, you talk like that because you’re so weak, that’s all. You’ll feel quite different in another day or so. Here, just let me give you a few spoonfuls of this beef-tea. I made it myself, so I won’t take a refusal. There’s a good maid, and now you must shut your eyes and go to sleep again.’

‘Don’t leave me,’ murmured Nell, as she lay with her hand clasped in her mother’s. ‘Talk to me, mother. Tell me you are really glad that I am better, and I will try to live for your sake.’

‘Glad, child! Why, what are you thinking of? Glad to get my own lass back from the grave, as you may say? I should be a nice mother if I weren’t. Don’t you know by this time that you’ve been my hope and pride ever since you was born? Why, I’ve been praying night and day to the Lord to spare you for weeks past. Ay, and not only me; all Usk has been asking the same thing, and there’s been one in particular as has wearied Heaven with prayers for your recovery, if ever man did.’

‘_One in particular?_’ echoed the sick girl faintly curious. ‘Who was that, mother?’

‘Why, that young saint on earth, Hugh Owen, to be sure. I never saw a man so unhappy as he’s been about you. He looks ten years older since you were taken ill. Do you know, Nell, that he’s been here every minute he could spare from his work, kneeling by your bedside whilst you were raving in delirium, praying with all his heart and soul, that God would spare your precious life to us a little longer. Hugh Owen has been your tenderest nurse. I’ve seen him sit here, without saying a word for hours together, only holding you in his arms when you got a bit violent, and coaxing you by every means in his power to take a drop of wine or a spoonful of jelly. I do believe that you owe your life in a great measure to Hugh’s care (and so I’ve told father that if you lived, it would be), for though we all tried our best, no one has had so much influence over you as him, or been able to make you take nourishment like he could.’

‘Did he hear me talk?’ asked Nell, fearfully.

‘Hear you talk, child? Well, pretty nearly all Usk heard you talk, you used to scream so loud sometimes. But it was all nonsense. No one could understand it, so you needn’t be afraid you told any of your little secrets. I couldn’t make head nor tail of what you said, nor Hugh either. But his presence seemed to comfort you, so I let the poor lad have his way. He was nearly broken-hearted when he left the farm last night, you were so terribly weak and low. I expect he’ll nearly go out of his mind when he hears the news I shall have to tell him this evening. He’ll offer up a grand prayer of thanksgiving before he goes to his bed to-night.’

But at this juncture, seeing that Nell’s weary eyes had closed again, Mrs Llewellyn covered her carefully with the bedclothes, and went to communicate the fact of her improvement to the farmer. As the husband and wife were sitting at their evening meal, Hugh Owen, as usual, walked in. His face was very pale, and his expression careworn. His first anxious inquiry was naturally for Nell. When he heard the great improvement that had taken place in her, and that Doctor Cowell had said at his last visit that she was now on the road to recovery, his pallid cheeks glowed with excitement.

‘God Almighty be thanked for all His goodness!’ he said solemnly, and then added rapidly,--‘May I see her, Mrs Llewellyn? Just for one moment. I will not speak to her, if you do not think it desirable, but to see her once more sensible and in her right mind would make me so happy. I shall hardly be able to believe the joyful news is true otherwise.’

The mother looked doubtful.

‘Well, I don’t quite know how Nell would take it, my lad. You’ve been main good to her, I know; but it wouldn’t do to upset her now, and you would be the last to wish it.’

‘Upset her! Oh, no; but I have sat by her so often during her illness.’

‘Ay, when she wasn’t aware of your presence; that makes all the difference. But,’ noting the look of disappointment in the young man’s face, she added, ‘I’ll just step up and see how matters are now; and if Nell’s sleeping you shall have a peep at her, in return for all your goodness.’

The young man thanked her, and in a few minutes she came back to say that her daughter was fast asleep, and, if Hugh would follow her, he should see so for himself. He rose at once, his face radiant with joy, and crept on tip-toe up the stairs and into the familiar bedroom. There lay Nell, prostrate in the sleep of exhaustion--her hands folded together on the coverlet, her head well back on her pillow, her mouth slightly parted, her breathing as regular and calm as that of an infant. At the sight Hugh’s eyes filled with tears.

‘Doesn’t she look as if she were praying--thanking God for His goodness to her?’ he whispered to Mrs Llewellyn. ‘Oh, let us pray too. We can never thank Him enough for all He has done for us.’

And he fell on his knees by the bedside, Mrs Llewellyn following his example.

‘Oh, Father, God, Protector, Friend,’ said the young man, with tears running down his worn cheeks, ‘what can we render to Thee for all Thou art to us, for all Thou doest for us? We have cried to Thee in our distress, and Thou hast heard our cry. We wept in our abject fear of loss, and Thou hast dried our tears. Thou hast sent Thy messenger angels, with healing in their wings, to succour this dear child of Thine--this dear companion of ours--and give her and us alike time to do something to prove the sense of gratitude we have for Thy great love to us. Oh, Father, make us more grateful, more thankful, more resolved to live the lives which Thou hast given us, to Thee, more careful of the beautiful, earthly love with which Thou hast brightened and made happy these lives. Amen.’