All active suffering had left her, and she would fain have been at peace; but the hand that clasped hers would not be denied. The motherly voice that had calmed the wildest fantasies of her fevered brain spoke now to her with tenderest encouragement; the love that surrounded her drew her, uplifted her, sustained her. And gradually, as she crept back from the shadows, she came to lean upon this love as upon a sure support, to count upon it as her own exclusive possession--a wonderful new gift that had come to her out of the darkness.
She still welcomed her friend Scott at her bedside, but very curiously she had grown a little shy in his presence. She could not forget that dream of hers, and for a long time she was haunted by the dread that he had in some way come to know of it. Though the steady eyes never held anything but the utmost kindness and sympathy, she was half afraid to meet them lest they should look into her heart and see the vision she had seen. She never called him Mr. Greatheart now.
With Isabel, beloved nurse and companion, she was completely at her ease. A great change had come over Isabel--such a change as turns the bare earth into a garden of spring when the bitter winter is past at last. All the ice-bound bitterness had been swept utterly away, and in its place there blossomed such a wealth of mother-love as transformed her completely.
She spent herself with the most lavish devotion in Dinah's service. There was not a wish that she expressed that was not swiftly and abundantly satisfied. Night and day she was near her, ignoring all Biddy's injunctions to rest, till the old woman, seeing the light that had dawned in the shadowed eyes, left her to take her own way in peace. She hovered in the background, always ready in case her mistress's new-found strength should fail. But Isabel did not need her care. All her being was concentrated upon the task of bringing Dinah back to life, and she thought of nothing else, meeting the strain with that strength which comes in great emergencies to all.
And as she gradually succeeded in her task, a great peace descended upon her, such as she had never known before. Biddy sometimes gazed in amazement at the smooth brow and placid countenance at Dinah's bedside.