gure,
clad in costly camel's-hair garments, with Russian sables wrapped about
her delicate throat, with a long drifting plume casting flickering
shadows over her sweet flowerlike face; the attractive embodiment of
patrician birth and environment of riches, and all that the world
values most--then down at the human epitome of wretchedness,
represented by a bronze-crowned head, with singularly magnetic eyes,
crimsoned cheeks, and a perfect mouth, whose glowing, fever-rouged lips
were curved in a shadowy smile, as she muttered incoherently of
incidents, connected with the life of a poverty-stricken adventuress?
Was friendly fate flying danger signals by arranging and accentuating
this vivid contrast, in order to recall his vagrant wits, to cement his
wavering allegiance?

He was a brave man, but he shivered slightly, as he confronted his own
insurgent and defiant heart; and involuntarily, his fingers dropped
Leo's, and his right hand tightened on the hot palm throbbing against
it.

On that dark tossing main, where delirium drove Beryl's consciousness
to and fro like a rudderless wreck, did some mysterious communion of
spirits survive? Did some subtle mesmeric current telegraph her soul,
that her foul wrongs were at last avenged? Whatever the cause,
certainly a strangely clear, musical laugh broke suddenly from her
lovely lips, mingled with a triumphant "Che sara, sara!" The heavy lids
slowly drooped, the head turned wearily away.

Smothering a long drawn sigh, which his pride throttled, Mr. Dunbar
rose and stood beside his fiancee.

"You have been feeling her pulse, how is the fever?" asked Leo.

"About as high as it can mount. The pulse is frightfully rapid. I did
not even attempt to count it."

"Mrs. Singleton tells me she is entirely unconscious--recognizes no
one."

"At times, I think she has partly lucid glimpses; for instance, a
little while ago she called me 'Tiberius', the same appellation she
unaccountably bestowed on me the day of her preliminary examination.
Evidently she associates me with every cruel, brutal monster, and even
in delirium maintains her aversion."

Miss Gordon's hand stole into his, pressing it gently in mute
attestation of sympathy. After a moment, she said in a low tone:

"She is very beautiful. What a noble, pure face? How exquisitely turned
her white throat, and wrists, and hands."

He merely inclined his head in assent.

"It seems a profanation to connect the idea of crime wi