be hers: it was
inevitable that he should connect her with the one touch of beauty in the
dingy scene.

Nine o'clock was an early hour for a visit, but Selden had passed beyond
all such conventional observances. He only knew that he must see Lily
Bart at once--he had found the word he meant to say to her, and it could
not wait another moment to be said. It was strange that it had not come
to his lips sooner--that he had let her pass from him the evening before
without being able to speak it. But what did that matter, now that a new
day had come? It was not a word for twilight, but for the morning.

Selden ran eagerly up the steps and pulled the bell; and even in his
state of self-absorption it came as a sharp surprise to him that the door
should open so promptly. It was still more of a surprise to see, as he
entered, that it had been opened by Gerty Farish--and that behind her, in
an agitated blur, several other figures ominously loomed.

"Lawrence!" Gerty cried in a strange voice, "how could you get here so
quickly?"--and the trembling hand she laid on him seemed instantly to
close about his heart.

He noticed the other faces, vague with fear and conjecture--he saw the
landlady's imposing bulk sway professionally toward him; but he shrank
back, putting up his hand, while his eyes mechanically mounted the steep
black walnut stairs, up which he was immediately aware that his cousin
was about to lead him.

A voice in the background said that the doctor might be back at any
minute--and that nothing, upstairs, was to be disturbed. Some one else
exclaimed: "It was the greatest mercy--" then Selden felt that Gerty had
taken him gently by the hand, and that they were to be suffered to go up
alone.

In silence they mounted the three flights, and walked along the passage
to a closed door. Gerty opened the door, and Selden went in after her.
Though the blind was down, the irresistible sunlight poured a tempered
golden flood into the room, and in its light Selden saw a narrow bed
along the wall, and on the bed, with motionless hands and calm
unrecognizing face, the semblance of Lily Bart.

That it was her real self, every pulse in him ardently denied. Her real
self had lain warm on his heart but a few hours earlier--what had he to
do with this estranged and tranquil face which, for the first time,
neither paled nor brightened at his coming?

Gerty, strangely tranquil too, with the conscious self-control of one who
has m