her that the servants are not to be trusted within hearing of
the wild words which Clara speaks in the trance. Has any one of them
ventured into the garden? No. They are out of hearing at the window,
waiting for the signal which tells them that their help is needed.

Turning toward Clara once more, Mrs. Crayford hears the vacantly uttered
words, falling faster and faster from her lips,

"Frank! Frank! Frank! Don't drop behind--don't trust Richard Wardour.
While you can stand, keep with the other men, Frank!"

(The farewell warning of Crayford in the solitudes of the Frozen Deep,
repeated by Clara in the garden of her English home!)

A moment of silence follows; and, in that moment, the vision has
changed. She sees him on the iceberg now, at the mercy of the bitterest
enemy he has on earth. She sees him drifting--over the black water,
through the ashy light.

"Wake, Frank! wake and defend yourself! Richard Wardour knows that
I love you--Richard Wardour's vengeance will take your life! Wake,
Frank--wake! You are drifting to your death!" A low groan of horror
bursts from her, sinister and terrible to hear. "Drifting! drifting!"
she whispers to herself--"drifting to his death!"

Her glassy eyes suddenly soften--then close. A long shudder runs through
her. A faint flush shows itself on the deadly pallor of her face, and
fades again. Her limbs fail her. She sinks into Mrs. Crayford's arms.

The servants, answering the call for help, carry her into the house.
They lay her insensible on her bed. After half an hour or more, her eyes
open again--this time with the light of life in them--open, and rest
languidly on the friend sitting by the bedside.

"I have had a dreadful dream," she murmurs faintly. "Am I ill, Lucy? I
feel so weak."

Even as she says the words, sleep, gentle, natural sleep, takes her
suddenly, as it takes young children weary with their play. Though it
is all over now, though no further watching is required, Mrs. Crayford
still keeps her place by the bedside, too anxious and too wakeful to
retire to her own room.

On other occasions, she is accustomed to dismiss from her mind the words
which drop from Clara in the trance. This time the effort to dismiss
them is beyond her power. The words haunt her. Vainly she recalls to
memory all that the doctors have said to her, in speaking of Clara in
the state of trance. "What she vaguely dreads for the lost man whom she
loves is mingled in her mind with what sh