THE HEADSTONE AT VENTNOR.
Yes, there it was in black and white—"Helen Talboys, 22."
When George told the on the Argus that if he any of his wife he should dead, he spoke in perfect good faith; and yet, here were the that come to him, and he sat rigid, white and helpless, at the of his friend.
The of the had him. In this and of mind he to wonder what had happened, and why it was that one line in the Times newspaper have so an upon him.
Then by this of his slowly out of his mind, succeeded by a painful of things.
The August sunshine, the window-panes and shabby-painted blinds, a file of fly-blown play-bills to the wall, the black and empty fire-places, a bald-headed old man over the Morning Advertizer, the slip-shod waiter a table-cloth, and Robert Audley's looking at him full of alarm—he that all these took proportions, and then, one by one, melted into dark and his eyes, He that there was a great noise, as of a dozen steam-engines and in his ears, and he nothing more—except that somebody or something to the ground.
He opened his upon the in a and room, the only by the of at a distance.
He looked about him wonderingly, but indifferently. His old friend, Robert Audley, was seated by his smoking. George was on a low iron opposite to an open window, in which there was a of flowers and two or three in cages.
"You don't mind the pipe, do you, George?" his friend asked, quietly.
"No."
He for some time looking at the flowers and the birds; one was a to the setting sun.
"Do the you, George? Shall I take them out of the room?"
"No; I like to them sing."
Robert Audley the out of his pipe, the upon the mantelpiece, and going into the next room, returned presently with a cup of tea.
"Take this, George," he said, as he the cup on a little table close to George's pillow; "it will do your good."
The man did not answer, but looked slowly the room, and then at his friend's face.
"Bob," he said, "where are we?"
"In my chambers, dear boy, in the Temple. You have no of your own, so you may as well with me while you're in town."
George passed his hand once or twice across his forehead, and then, in a manner, said, quietly:
"That newspaper this morning, Bob; what was it?"
"Never mind just now, old boy; drink some tea."
"Yes, yes," George, impatiently, himself upon the bed, and about him with eyes. "I all about it. Helen! my Helen! my wife, my darling, my only love! Dead, dead!"
"George," said Robert Audley, his hand upon the man's arm, "you must that the person name you saw in the paper may not be your wife. There may have been some other Helen Talboys."
"No, no!" he cried; "the age with hers, and Talboys is such an name."
"It may be a for Talbot."
"No, no, no; my wife is dead!"
He off Robert's hand, and from the bed, walked to the door.
"Where are you going?" his friend.
"To Ventnor, to see her grave."
"Not to-night, George, not to-night. I will go with you myself by the train to-morrow."
Robert him to the bed, and him to again. He then gave him an opiate, which had been left for him by the medical man they had called in at the coffee-house in Bridge street, when George fainted.
So George Talboys into a slumber, and that he to Ventnor, to his wife alive and happy, but wrinkled, old, and gray, and to his son into a man.
Early the next he was seated opposite to Robert Audley in the first-class of an express, through the open country toward Portsmouth.
They at Ventnor under the of the sun. As the two men came from the steamer, the people on the at George's white and beard.
"What are we to do, George?" Robert Audley asked. "We have no to the people you want to see."
The man looked at him with a pitiful, expression. The big was as as a baby; and Robert Audley, the most and of men, himself called upon to act for another. He rose to himself, and equal to the occasion.
"Had we not ask at one of the about a Mrs. Talboys, George?" he said.
"Her father's name was Maldon," George muttered; "he have sent her here to die alone."
They said nothing more; but Robert walked to a hotel where he for a Mr. Maldon.
Yes, they told him, there was a of that name stopping at Ventnor, a Captain Maldon; his was dead. The waiter would go and for the address.
The hotel was a place at this season; people in and out, and a great of and waiters about the halls.
George Talboys against the doorpost, with much the same look in his face, as that which had his friend in the Westminister coffee-house.
The was now. His wife, Captain Maldon's was dead.
The waiter returned in about five minutes to say that Captain Maldon was at Lansdowne Cottage, No. 4.
They easily the house, a shabby, low-windowed cottage, looking toward the water.
Was Captain Maldon at home? No, the said; he had gone out on the beach with his little grandson. Would the walk in and a bit?
George his friend into the little parlor—dusty, furnished, and disorderly, with a child's toys on the floor, and the of tobacco about the window-curtains.
"Look!" said George, pointing to a picture over the mantelpiece.
It was his own portrait, painted in the old days. A good likeness, him in uniform, with his in the background.
Perhaps the most of men would have been so wise a as Robert Audley. He did not a word to the widower, but seated himself with his to George, looking out of the open window.
For some time the man about the room, looking at and sometimes the nick-nacks here and there.
Her workbox, with an piece of work; her full of from Byron and Moore, in his own hand; some books which he had her, and a of flowers in a they had in Italy.
"Her portrait used to by the of mine," he muttered; "I wonder what they have done with it."
By-and-by he said, after about an hour's silence:
"I should like to see the woman of the house; I should like to ask her about—"
He down, and his in his hands.
Robert the landlady. She was a good-natured creature, to and death, for many of her came to her to die.
She told all the particulars of Mrs. Talboys' last hours; how she had come to Ventnor only ten days her death, in the last stage of decline; and how, day by day, she had gradually, but surely, under the malady. Was the any relative? she asked of Robert Audley, as George aloud.
"Yes, he is the lady's husband."
"What!" the woman cried; "him as her so cruel, and left her with her boy upon her old father's hands, which Captain Maldon has told me often, with the in his eyes?"
"I did not her," George out; and then he told the history of his three years' struggle.
"Did she speak of me?" he asked; "did she speak of me—at—at the last?"
"No, she off as as a lamb. She said very little from the first; but the last day she nobody, not her little boy, her old father, who took on awful. Once she off wild-like, talking about her mother, and about the it was to her to die in a place, till it was to her."
"Her mother died when she was a child," said George. "To think that she should her and speak of her, but once of me."
The woman took him into the little in which his wife had died. He by the and the pillow tenderly, the as he did so.
While he was kneeling, praying, perhaps, with his in this humble, snow-white pillow, the woman took something from a drawer. She gave it to him when he rose from his knees; it was a long of in paper.
"I cut this off when she in her coffin," she said, "poor dear?"
He pressed the soft lock to his lips. "Yes," he murmured; "this is the dear that I have so often when her upon my shoulder. But it always had a in it then, and now it and straight."
"It in illness," said the landlady. "If you'd like to see where they have her, Mr. Talboys, my little boy shall you the way to the churchyard."
So George Talboys and his friend walked to the spot, where, a of earth, to which the of fresh adhered, that wife of George had so often in the antipodes.
Robert left the man by the of this newly-made grave, and returning in about a of an hour, that he had not once stirred.
He looked up presently, and said that if there was a stone-mason's near he should like to give an order.
They very easily the stonemason, and the of the man's yard, George Talboys in pencil this for the of his wife's grave:
Sacred to the Memory of
HELEN,
THE BELOVED WIFE OF GEORGE TALBOYS,
"Who this life
August 24th, 18—, 22,
Deeply by her Husband.
