angerously. She
continually repeats your name, and now wishes very much to see you.
If you possibly can, come in the carriage.--Very sincerely yours, JOHN
RAUNHAM.'

'How comes she ill?' Owen inquired of the coachman.

'She caught a violent cold by standing out of doors in the damp, on
the night the steward ran away. Ever since, till this morning, she
complained of fulness and heat in the chest. This morning the maid ran
in and told her suddenly that Manston had killed himself in gaol--she
shrieked--broke a blood-vessel--and fell upon the floor. Severe internal
haemorrhage continued for some time and then stopped. They say she is
sure to get over it; but she herself says no. She has suffered from it
before.'

Cytherea was ready in a few moments, and entered the carriage.

3. SEVEN O'CLOCK P.M.

Soft as was Cytherea's motion along the corridors of Knapwater House,
the preternaturally keen intelligence of the suffering woman caught
the maiden's well-known footfall. She entered the sick-chamber with
suspended breath.

In the room everything was so still, and sensation was as it were so
rarefied by solicitude, that thinking seemed acting, and the lady's
weak act of trying to live a silent wrestling with all the powers of the
universe. Nobody was present but Mr. Raunham, the nurse having left the
room on Cytherea's entry, and the physician and surgeon being engaged
in a whispered conversation in a side-chamber. Their patient had been
pronounced out of danger.

Cytherea went to the bedside, and was instantly recognized. O, what a
change--Miss Aldclyffe dependent upon pillows! And yet not a forbidding
change. With weakness had come softness of aspect: the haughtiness was
extracted from the frail thin countenance, and a sweeter mild placidity
had taken its place.

Miss Aldclyffe signified to Mr. Raunham that she would like to be alone
with Cytherea.

'Cytherea?' she faintly whispered the instant the door was closed.

Cytherea clasped the lady's weak hand, and sank beside her.

Miss Aldclyffe whispered again. 'They say I am certain to live; but I
know that I am certainly going to die.'

'They know, I think, and hope.'

'I know best, but we'll leave that. Cytherea--O Cytherea, can you
forgive me!'

Her companion pressed her hand.

'But you don't know yet--you don't know yet,' the invalid murmured. 'It
is forgiveness for that misrepresentation to Edward Springrove that I
implore, and for putting such force u