CHAPTER X.
DOROTHY'S REFUGE.
With the decay of summer, lady Vaughan began again to sink, and became at length so weak that Dorothy rarely left her room.

The departure of Richard Heywood to join the rebels affected her deeply.

The report of the utter rout of the parliamentary forces at Edgehill, lighted up her face for the last time with a glimmer of earthly gladness, which the very different news that followed speedily extinguished; and after that she declined more rapidly.

Mrs.Rees told Dorothy that she would yield to the first frost.

But she lingered many weeks.