Dr. Cavendish sighed, and turning to Thaddeus, directed to him the
answer which his friend's question demanded. "I am afraid, my dear
Mr. Constantine," said he, in a reluctant voice, "that you are to
sustain a new trial! I fear she cannot live eight-and-forty hours."
Thaddeus cast down his eyes and shuddered, but made no reply. Further
remarks were prevented by a messenger from the countess, who desired
Mr. Constantine's immediate attendance at her bedside. He obeyed. In
half an hour he returned, with the mark of tears upon his cheek.
"Dearest Thaddeus!" cried Pembroke, "I trust the countess is not
worse? This threatened new bereavement is too much: it afflicts my
very heart." Indeed it rent it; for Pembroke could not help
internally acknowledging that when Sobieski should close the eyes of
Lady Tinemouth, he would be paying the last sad office to his last
friend. That dear distinction he durst no longer arrogate to himself.
Denied the fulfilment of its duties, he thought that to retain the
title would be an assumption without a right.
Thaddeus drew his hand over his again filling eyes. "The countess
herself," said he, "feels the truth of what Dr. Cavendish told us.
She sent for me, and begged me, as I loved her or would wish to see
her die in peace, to devise some means for bringing her daughter to
the Abbey to-night. As for Lord Harwold, she says his behavior since
he arrived at manhood has been of a nature so cruel and unnatural,
that she would not draw on herself the misery, nor on him the added
guilt, of a refusal; but with regard to Lady Albina, who has been no
sharer in those barbarities, she trusts a daughter's heart might be
prevailed on to seek a last embrace from a dying parent.
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