o a flood of tears.
So great had been the strain that she was completely unnerved, and had
quite forgotten the likelihood of her husband's return from Richmond, as
well as the mysterious disappearance of Jessica, who had not been seen
in the house since the arrival of Adrien Leroy and his unconscious
burden.

This sudden realisation of all the presentiment of evil which Lucy
Ashford had ever in her mind, had burst on her like a thunderbolt. She
had known always that the man, Mr. Jasper Vermont, who knew her secret,
was alive; but never before had she been actually threatened with its
betrayal. Her father, Mr. Harker, had always stood between her and that
dreadful possibility.

Presently, she jumped up and called to Jessica. Then she remembered that
the girl had disappeared from the time she had sent her from the room.
Fearful that Vermont might yet change his mind and return for the night,
she ran to the door, calling out Jessica's name in a paroxysm of nervous
terror, which finally, on receiving no reply, ended in a severe attack
of hysterics, in the midst of which her husband returned and found her.

With an exclamation of alarm, he raised her from the floor and bore her
upstairs to the bed on which Lady Merivale had lain such a short time
ago. He was greatly puzzled by the disordered appearance of the room,
and his first thought was of burglars. He gave no time to this, however,
but hastened to get his wife into bed, then rushed out for a doctor.
When he returned with him it was found that Lucy had relapsed into a
state of fever, and was talking deliriously, of an inn at Canterbury, an
individual of the name of Johann Wilfer, and most of all, making
plaintive appeals to Jasper Vermont not to betray her.

As the next day Jessica had not returned, Ashford found all his work cut
out for him, to see after the shop and the children, as well as his
wife. A kindly neighbour came to his rescue; but John insisted on
nursing Lucy himself, while the woman remained downstairs.

At first, the husband paid little attention to the wandering, incoherent
sentences of his wife; but as the first excitement died down, and they
began to take distinct form, he bent over her, and learned the one error
of her life. Naturally, poor John recoiled in horror; the whole thing
seemed so incredible, so impossible to believe. Yet, when he had had
time to reflect, he saw that this explained all the little strangenesses
in his wife's conduct an