“Yes, dear—dreaming. This is your own room, and you are on your own bed. You have only been frightened by a fearful dream.”
“Only a dream! How thankful I am! Oh! it was terrible!”
“What was it about, daughter?” asked Mrs. Markland.
Fanny, whose mind was getting clearer and calmer, did not at once reply.
“You mentioned the name of Mr. Lyon,” said the mother.
“Did I?” Fanny’s voice expressed surprise.
“Yes. Was it of him that you were dreaming?”
“I saw him in my dream,” was answered.
“Why were you afraid of him?”
“It was a very strange dream, mother—very strange,” said Fanny, evidently not speaking from a free choice.
“I thought I was in our garden among the flowers. And as I stood there, Mr. Lyon came in through the gate and walked up to me. He looked just as he did when he was here; only it seemed that about his face and form there was even a manlier beauty. Taking my hand, he led me to one of the garden chairs, and we sat down side by side. And now I began to see a change in him. His eyes, that were fixed upon mine, grew brighter and deeper, until it seemed as if I could look far down into their burning depths. His breath came hot upon my face. Suddenly, he threw an arm around me, and then I saw myself in the strong folds of a great serpent! I screamed for help, and next found myself in your arms. Oh! it was a strange and a fearful dream!”
“And it may not be all a dream, Fanny,” said Mrs. Markland, in a very impressive voice.
“Not all a dream, mother!” Fanny seemed startled at the words.
“No, dear. Dreams are often merely fantastic. But there come visions in sleep, sometimes, that are permitted as warnings, and truly represent things existing in real life.”
“I do not understand you, mother.”
“There is in the human mind a quality represented by the serpent, and also a quality represented by the dove. When our Saviour said of Herod, ‘Go tell that fox,’ he meant to designate the man as having the quality of a fox.”
“But how does this apply to dreams?” asked Fanny.
“He who sends his angels to watch over and protect us in sleep, may permit them to bring before us, in dreaming images, the embodied form of some predominating quality in those whose association may do us harm. The low, subtle selfishness of the sensual principle will then take its true form of a wily serpent.”
Fanny caught her breath once or twice, as these words fell upon her ears, and then said, in a deprecating voice—
“Oh, mother! Don’t! don’t!” And lifting her head from the bosom of her parent, she turned her face away, and buried it in the pillow. As she did not move for the space of several minutes, Mrs. Markland thought it unwise to intrude other remarks upon her, believing that the distinct image she had already presented would live in her memory and do its work. Soon after, she retired to her own room. Half an hour later, and both were sleeping, in quiet unconsciousness.
CHAPTER XI.
LATE on the following day, Mr. Markland arrived from New York. Eager as all had been for his return, there was something of embarrassment in the meeting. The light-hearted gladness with which every one welcomed him, even after the briefest absence, was not apparent now. In the deep, calm eyes of his wife, as he looked lovingly into them, he saw the shadow of an unquiet spirit. And the tears which no effort of self-control could keep back from Fanny’s cheeks, as she caught his hand eagerly, and hid her face on his breast, answered too surely the question he most desired to ask. It was plain to him that Mr. Lyon’s letter had found its way into her hands.
“I wish it had not been so!” was the involuntary mental ejaculation. A sigh parted his lips—a sigh that only the quick ears of his wife perceived, and only her heart echoed.
During the short time the family were together that evening, Mr. Markland noticed in Fanny something that gave him concern. Her eyes always fell instantly when he looked at her, and she seemed sedulously to avoid his gaze. If he spoke to her, the colour mounted to her face, and she seemed strangely embarrassed. The fact of her having received a letter from Mr. Lyon, the contents of which he knew, as it came open in one received by himself from that gentleman, was not a sufficient explanation of so entire a change in her deportment.
Mr. Markland sought the earliest opportunity to confer with his wife on the subject of Fanny’s altered state of mind, and the causes leading thereto; but the conference did not result in much that was satisfactory to either of them.
“Have you said any thing to her about Mr. Lyon?” asked Mr. Markland.
“Very little,” was answered. “She thought it would only be courteous to reply to his letter; but I told her that, if he were a true man, and had a genuine respect for her, he would not wish to draw her into a correspondence on so slight an acquaintance; and that the only right manner of response was through you.”
“Through me!”
“Yes. Your acknowledgment, in Fanny’s name, when you are writing to Mr. Lyon, will be all that he has a right to expect, and all that our daughter should be permitted to give.”
“But if we restrict her to so cold a response, and that by second-hand, may she not be tempted to write to him without our knowledge?”
“No, Edward. I will trust her for that,” was the unhesitating answer.
“She is very young,” said Mr. Markland, as if speaking to himself.
“Oh, yes!” quickly returned his wife. “Years too young for an experience—or, I might say, a temptation—like this. I cannot but feel that, in writing to our child, Mr. Lyon abused the hospitality we extended to him.”
