he queried, addressing the portrait--"Ah, I need not ask! I
know! You would have brought your suffering brother home, to share all
you had;--you would have said to him 'Rest, and be thankful!' For you
never turned the needy from your door, my dear old dad!--never!--no
matter how much you were in need yourself!"

She wafted a kiss to the venerable face among the roses,--and then
turning, extinguished the lamp on the table. The dying glow of the fire
shone upon her for a moment, setting a red sparkle in her hair, and a
silvery one on the silky head of the little dog she carried, and
outlining her fine profile so that it gleamed with a pure soft pallor
against the surrounding darkness,--and with one final look round to see
that all was clear for the night, she went away noiselessly like a
lovely ghost and disappeared, her step making no sound on the short
wooden stairs that led to the upper room which she had hastily arranged
for her own accommodation, in place of the one now occupied by the
homeless wayfarer she had rescued.

There was no return of the storm. The heavens, with their mighty burden
of stars, remained clear and tranquil,--the raging voice of ocean was
gradually sinking into a gentle crooning song of sweet content,--and
within the little cottage complete silence reigned, unbroken save for
the dash of the stream outside, rushing down through the "coombe" to the
sea.

CHAPTER XIII

The next morning Helmsley was too ill to move from his bed, or to be
conscious of his surroundings. And there followed a long period which to
him was well-nigh a blank. For weeks he lay helpless in the grasp of a
fever which over and over again threatened to cut the last frail thread
of his life asunder. Pain tortured every nerve and sinew in his body,
and there were times of terrible collapse,--when he was conscious of
nothing save an intense longing to sink into the grave and have done
with all the sharp and cruel torment which kept him on the rack of
existence. In a semi-delirious condition he tossed and moaned the hours
away, hardly aware of his own identity. In certain brief pauses of the
nights and days, when pain was momentarily dulled by stupor, he saw, or
fancied he saw a woman always near him, with anxiety in her eyes and
words of soothing consolation on her lips;--and then he found himself
muttering, "Mary! Mary! God bless you!" over and over again. Once or
twice he dimly realised that a small dark man came to