n yours. My poor Ulpian!"

Despite her knowledge of the feverish condition of the sick woman, and
her incredulity with reference to the vision that so painfully
disturbed her, Salome's lips blanched, and a vague, nameless, horrible
dread seized her heart.

Very soon Miss Jane fell into a heavy sleep, and, while the nurse
busied herself in preparing a bottle of beef-tea, the orphan sat with
her head pressed against the bedpost, and her eyes riveted on the face
of the watch in her palm, where the minute-hand seemed now and then to
stop, as if for breathing-time, and the hour-hand to have forgotten
the way to two o'clock.

For nearly six months Salome had counted the weeks and days,--had
waited and hoped for the hour of Dr. Grey's return as the happiest of
her life,--had imagined his greeting, the bright, steady glow in his
fine eyes, the warm, cordial pressure of his white hand, the friendly
tones of his pleasant voice; for, though he had failed to bid her
good-by, fate could not cheat her out of the interview that must
follow his arrival. Fancy had painted so vividly all the incidents
that would characterize this longed-for greeting, that she had lived
it over a thousand times; and, now that the meeting seemed actually at
hand, she asked herself whether it were possible that disappointment
could pour one poisonous drop into the brimming draught of joy that
rose foaming in amber bubbles to her parched lips.

In the profound silence that pervaded the darkened room, the ticking
of the watch was annoyingly audible, and seemed to Salome's strained
and excited nerves so unusually loud that she feared it might disturb
the sleeper. At a quarter to two o'clock she went to the hearth and
noiselessly renewed the fire, laying two fresh pieces of oak across
the shining brass andirons, whose feet represented lions' heads.

She swept the hearth, arranged some vials that were scattered on the
dressing-table, and gave a few improving touches to a vase filled with
white and orange crocuses, then crept back to the bedside and again
picked up the watch. It still lacked fifteen minutes of two, and,
looking more closely, she found that it had stopped. Tossing it into a
hollow formed by the folds of the coverlid, and repressing an
impatient ejaculation, she listened for the sound of the railroad
whistle, which, though muffled by distance, had not failed to reach
her every day during the past week.

Presently the silence, which made her