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'O Rachael, Rachael!'
'Thou hast been a cruel sufferer, Heaven reward thee!' she said, in
compassionate accents. 'I am thy poor friend, with all my heart
and mind.'
The wounds of which she had spoken, seemed to be about the neck of
the self-made outcast. She dressed them now, still without showing
her. She steeped a piece of linen in a basin, into which she
poured some liquid from a bottle, and laid it with a gentle hand
upon the sore. The three-legged table had been drawn close to the
bedside, and on it there were two bottles. This was one.
It was not so far off, but that Stephen, following her hands with
his eyes, could read what was printed on it in large letters. He
turned of a deadly hue, and a sudden horror seemed to fall upon
him.
'I will stay here, Stephen,' said Rachael, quietly resuming her
seat, 'till the bells go Three. 'Tis to be done again at three,
and then she may be left till morning.'
'But thy rest agen to-morrow's work, my dear.'
'I slept sound last night. I can wake many nights, when I am put
to it. 'Tis thou who art in need of rest - so white and tired.
Try to sleep in the chair there, while I watch. Thou hadst no
sleep last night, I can well believe. To-morrow's work is far
harder for thee than for me.'
He heard the thundering and surging out of doors, and it seemed to
him as if his late angry mood were going about trying to get at
him. She had cast it out; she would keep it out; he trusted to her
to defend him from himself.
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