I felt that it might be a great risk to take that delicate boy
to Italy again, where he had been ill before, and I told John I wished
we could prevent it. I could not forget that his death would be a fine
thing for my brother, and I felt a sort of fear that this would be the
end of it."
Valentine was relieved. She evidently knew nothing, and he could listen
calmly while she went on.
"My mere sense of the danger made it a necessity for me to act. I
suppose you will be surprised when I tell you"--here two more tears
fell--"that I wrote to Mrs. Melcombe. I knew she was determined to go on
the Continent, and I said if she liked to leave her boy behind, I would
take charge of him. It was the day before dear Fred was taken ill."
"And she declined!" said Valentine. "Well, it was very kind of you, very
good of you, and just like you. Let us hope poor Mrs. Melcombe does not
remember it now."
"Yes, she declined; said her boy had an excellent constitution. Where
did the poor little fellow die?"
"At Corfu."
Emily wept for sympathy with the mother, and Valentine sat still
opposite to her, and was glad of the silence; it pleased him to think of
this that Emily had done, till all on a sudden some familiar words out
of the Bible flashed into his mind, strange, quaint words, and it seemed
much more as if somebody kept repeating them in his presence than as if
he had turned them over himself to the surface, from among the mass of
scraps that were lying littered about in the chambers of his memory.
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