But she herself had not the
strength to tell her. Besides, it seemed as though these close cords of
love were knitted so tightly around the mother, and every breath of her
fading life so fondly cherished, that she could not perforce depart.
Months might pass ere that frail tabernacle was quite dissolved.

As the winter glided away, Mrs. Rothesay seemed much better. One evening
in March, when Harold Gwynne came laden with a whole basket of violets,
he said--and truly--that she was looking as blooming as the spring
itself. Olive coincided in this opinion--nay, declared, smiling, that
any one would fancy her mother was only making pretence of illness, to
win more kindness and consideration.

"As if you had not enough of that from every one, mamma! I never knew
such a spoilt darling in all my life; and yet see, Mr. Gwynne, how
meekly she bears it, and how beautiful and content she looks!"

It was true. Let us draw the picture which lived in Olive's memory
evermore.

Mrs. Rothesay sat in a little low chair--her own chair, which no one
else ever claimed. She did not wear an invalid's shawl, but a graceful
wrapping-gown of pale colours--such as she had always loved, and which
suited well her delicate, fragile beauty. Closely tied over her silvery
hair--the only sign of age--was a little cap, whose soft pink gauze lay
against her cheek--that cheek which even now was all unwrinkled, and
tinted with a lovely faint rose colour, like a young girl's. Her eyes
were cast down; she had a habit of doing this lest others might see
there the painful expression of blindness; but her mouth smiled a
serene, cheerful, holy smile, such as is rarely seen on human face, save
when earth's dearest happiness is beginning to melt away, dimmed in the
coming brightness of heaven. Her little thin hands lay crossed on her
knee, one finger playing as she often did, with her wedding-ring, now
worn to a mere thread of gold.

Her daughter looked at her with eyes of passionate yearning that threw
into one minute's gaze the love of a whole lifetime. Harold Gwynne
looked at her too, and then at Olive. He thought, "Can she, if she knows
what I know--can she be resigned--nay, happy! Then, what a sublime
faith hers must be!"

Olive seemed not to see him, but only her mother. She gazed and gazed,
then she came and knelt before Mrs. Rothesay, and wound her arms round
her.

"Darling, kiss me! or I shall fear you are growing quite an angel--an
angel with wi