down upon
hers, she might die there, after a moment, in his arms. It would be
taking advantage; in her present state of physical weakness her will
might not be able to help her as it had helped her before; she was
powerless to resist, and she loved him,--oh yes, he knew it fully now,
she loved him. But as soon as she should become conscious that she had
yielded, then the reaction would come. Between her love and her sense of
duty, this proud will of hers had held the balance. It seemed to him
that if he should break down by force that balance, her life might go as
well.

He went on therefore, he bore her through the garden towards the house.
Her face in its stillness had now an expression that frightened him, it
was like the lassitude of a person who has struggled to the utmost, and
then given up.

The Doctor and Celestine were waiting at the lower door.

Winthrop refused their aid, he carried Margaret up the stairs to her own
room, and laid her down upon the bed.

"I will wait below, Doctor. Come and tell me, please, what you make
out."

The Doctor had divined a good deal during this last quarter of an hour,
in this stricken woman, this abruptly speaking man, he felt the close
presence of something he fully believed in, old though he
was--overwhelming love; placed as they were, it could bring only
unhappiness. He had no confidence whatever in Winthrop, simply because
he was a man. In such situations men were selfish (he himself should
have been no better); of course at the time they did not call it
selfishness, they called it devotion. But in Margaret his confidence was
absolute. And it was with a deep, tender pity for her, for all she had
still to go through, that he now bent over her.

Winthrop had gone down-stairs; he paced to and fro in the stone-flagged
hall below. The door stood open, the deep soft blue of the Florida sky
filled the square frame. "If only she doesn't die!" This was the
paralyzing dread that held him like a suffocation. He kept thinking how
like a dead person she had looked as he laid her down. "If she comes
to,--revives, I will go away, and stay away." In his fear, he could
consent to anything.

The Doctor came down after a while. They were two men together, so their
words were few; they were just enough to answer the purpose. "I think I
can assure you that she will come out of it safely," the Doctor said.
"She seems unaccountably weak, she will have to keep her bed for a
while; but I