agitated her form, and looking up with just a gleam
of recognition, she passed into another swoon, thence to another.
Through long weary hours she only opened her eyes to close them,
blinded with the vision of unutterable woe; and so the long night wore
away.

Dr. Vaughan had given brief, stern orders, in accordance with which
Lucian Davlin had entrusted his wound to another surgeon for dressing,
and then, still in obedience to orders, had swallowed a soothing
potion and betaken himself to other apartments.

Henry had summoned a trusty nurse well known to Clarence Vaughan, to
assist him at the bedside of Madeline.

In the gray of morning, pallid and interesting, with his arm in a
sling, Lucian reappeared in the sick room. Evidently he had not
employed all of the intervening time in slumber, for his course of
action seemed to have been fully matured.

"She won't be able to leave here for many days, I should fancy?" he
half inquired in a low tone, sinking languidly into a sleepy-hollow,
commanding a view of the face of the patient, and the back of the
physician.

"Not alive," was the brief but significant answer.

"Not alive! Great heavens, doctor, don't tell me that my miserable
accident will cost the little girl her life!"

"Ah! your accident: how was that?" bending over Madeline.

"Why, you see," explained Davlin, "She picked up the pistol, and not
being acquainted with the use of fire-arms, desired to investigate
under my instructions. Having loaded it, explaining the process by
illustration, she, being timid, begged me to put it up. Laughing at
her fear, I was about to obey, when moving around carelessly, my hand
came in contact with that chair, setting the thing off. The sight of
my bleeding arm frightened her so that I saw she was about to faint.
As I caught her I myself lost consciousness, and we fell together. But
how will she come out, doctor? tell me that; poor little girl!"

"She will come out from this trance soon, to die almost immediately,
or to pass through a fever stage that may result fatally later. Her
bodily condition is one of unusual prostration from fatigue; and
evidently, she has been sustaining some undue excitement for a
considerable time."

"Been traveling, and pretty well tired with the journey. That, I
suppose, taken with this pistol affair--but tell me, doctor, what she
will need, so that I may attend to it immediately."

"If she is living at noon," said Dr. Vaughan, reflectivel