Chapter LXIV

He had felt that he was slowly dying; he knew that the physician and all the others thought so, too. He had not cared for it. He had rather exulted in the thought, for he had grown weary of his ruined life.

But when Aline Rodney in those few frank words told him that he was dying, it touched a chord in his heart that thrilled with the keenest pain. There came to him a pang that was like despair at the thought of leaving the world with her in it.

For the first time since that horrible night that had freed him from the hated fetters that bound him to the deformed maniac, he recalled his freedom with a vague, wild rush of happiness at all that was possible to him now, if only--if only that gaunt, black shadow of death had not stretched out its dark wings over him.

The pang was sharp and bitter. He loved her, and to his fancy it seemed as if fate had created this beautiful woman to be his wife. They had been at war with each other, and yet his heart had gone out to her with its whole freight of manly love and devotion. Must he die now and leave her for some other happy man--Mr. Lane, perhaps, of whom he was morbidly jealous?

A great longing for life took possession of him. Oh, if only he had battled harder to save this existence, which now he prized so much! He hated himself when he remembered that the physician had said that he had recklessly flung away his life by his despondency and hopelessness.

He pressed closer in his the little hand, and looked yearningly into the sweet girl-face with his hollow, burning, dark eyes.

“So you forgive me all?” he said, and she answered, gravely, “Yes, all!”

“Forgiveness is the boon we grant to death,” he said, mournfully. “But if I were going to live, Aline, would you be less kind? Would you refuse to forgive me then?”

He waited anxiously to hear what she would say, though he knew that it could not greatly matter now whether she answered him yea or not. It was too late now. He was drifting too near to the borders of the Shadow-Land.

She looked at him with a faint, almost tender smile on her exquisite red mouth.

“I would forgive you if you lived just as freely as I forgive you dying,” she answered. “You have made all the atonement you could, and I thank you and bless you for it.”

“You know all; they have told you all,” he said, with a faint flush creeping into his wan cheeks.

“Yes. I have heard all. It was very hard for you, Mr. Delaney. You must have been half mad with your trouble; so I forgive you now all that you have made me suffer. Perhaps it will make your dying-bed easier,” said Aline, with the wonderful pity and forgiveness of a true woman’s heart.

“Easier!” he repeated, with a groan, and she did not know that it only made it harder. “For if I lived, and she forgave me, I might win her yet,” he said to himself. “Oh, how hard it is to die knowing all this!”

The door opened softly, and the nurse entered with the inevitable tea and toast. She laid fresh coal on the fire and lighted the lamp. Then she nodded at Miss Rodney, with a smile.

“He will get well, now that you have come back and forgiven him,” she said.

“I hope that he may,” Aline answered, with frank simplicity.

And again she did not know how much harder these words of hers made it for the man who knew that he was sinking daily in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.

“What would I not give to live?” he inwardly groaned.

“I must go back to mamma now,” said Aline moving to the door.

His dark eyes followed her entreatingly.

“Do not go so soon,” he pleaded. “You have not told me yet where you have been and how you came back, and I am so anxious to hear.”

“Do stay a little longer, Miss Rodney,” pleaded Mrs. Griffin, and Aline readily consented to do so.