her gentle consideration, she thought it best to leave Pauline for a
time. Hours afterward she went in search of her, and found her under the
limes, weeping and moaning for the atonement she had made for her sin.

CHAPTER XLIII.

LADY DARRELL'S WILL.

Two years passed away, and Sir Vane St. Lawrence's circumstances were
rapidly improving; his letters were constant and cheerful--he spoke
always of the time when he should come home and claim Pauline for his
wife. She only sighed as she read the hopeful words, for she had
resolved that duty should be her watchword while Lady Darrell
lived--even should that frail, feeble life last for fifty years, she
would never leave her.

There came to her chill doubts and fears, dim, vague forebodings that
she should never see Vane again--that their last parting was for ever;
not that she doubted him, but that it seemed hopeless to think he would
wait until her hair was gray, and the light of her youth had left her.

Never mind--she had done her duty; she had sinned, but she had made the
noblest atonement possible for her sin.

Two years had passed, and the summer was drawing to a close. To those
who loved and tended her it seemed that Lady Darrell's life was closing
with it. Even Lady Hampton had ceased to speak hopefully, and Darrell
Court was gloomy with the shadow of the angel of death.

There came an evening when earth was very lovely--when the gold of the
setting sun, the breath of the western wind, the fragrance of the
flowers, the ripple of the fountains, the song of the birds, were all
beautiful beyond words to tell; and Lady Darrell, who had lain watching
the smiling summer heavens, said:

"I should like once more to see the sun set, Pauline. I should like to
sit at the window, and watch the moon rise."

"So you shall," responded Pauline. "You are a fairy queen. You have but
to wish, and the wish is granted."

Lady Darrell smiled--no one ever made her smile except Pauline; but the
fulfillment of the wish was not so easy after all. Lady Hampton's
foreboding was realized. Lady Darrell might have recovered from her
long, serious illness but that her mother's complaint, the deadly
inheritance of consumption, had seized upon her, and was gradually
destroying her.

It was no easy matter now to dress the wasted figure; but Pauline seemed
to have the strength, the energy of twenty nurses. She was always
willing, always cheerful, always ready; night and day seeme