o could be trusted, and as there had been already several
rings, she said to Esther that as the fever was probably malignant and
contagious, no one must be admitted to the house with the expectation of
seeing the patient, while the servants were advised to stay in their own
quarters, except as their services might be needed elsewhere. And so it
was that by the morrow the news had spread of some infectious disease at
No. ---- on Madison Square, which was shunned as carefully as if the
smallpox itself had been raging there instead of the brain fever, which
increased so fast that Morris suggested to Mrs. Cameron that she
telegraph for Wilford.

"They might find him, and they might not," Mark Ray said, when the
message came down to the office. "They could try, at all events," and in
a few moments the telegraphic wires were carrying the news of Katy's
illness, both to the West, where Wilford had gone, and to the East,
where Helen read with a blanched cheek that Katy perhaps was dying, and
she was needed again.

This was Mrs. Cameron's suggestion, wrung out by the knowing that some
woman besides herself was needed in the sickroom, and by the feeling
that Helen could be trusted with the story of the first marriage, which
Katy talked of constantly, telling it so accurately that only a fool
would fail of being convinced that there was much of truth in those
delirious ravings.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

THE FEVER AND ITS RESULTS.

On every business paper Wilford wrote or signed, and in every object he
met in his journey, one face had been prominent, and that the face of
Katy as it looked in the gray dawn when it lifted itself up to kiss him,
while the white lips tried to speak his pardon. Sometimes Wilford was
very sorry and full of remorse, knowing how Katy was suffering for his
sin; and then, when he remembered her long refusal to pardon him,
notwithstanding that he sued for it so earnestly, his self-importance
was touched, and he felt she had no right to be so obstinate. He did not
deserve it. He was a very kind, indulgent husband, who had raised her
from the humblest position to the very highest, and she ought not to
feel so indignant because he had kept from her an act which, after all,
did not affect her materially. If Genevra was living, and on this side
of the water, he could understand how it might be unpleasant for Katy
and for him, too, knowing, as they both did, that she was innocent of
the charges alleged against