u, too, my
dear son--my brave Harold!" And she turned to him as he stood, leaning
breathless against the wall.

He tried to speak, but in vain. There was one gasp; the blood poured in
a torrent from his mouth, and he fell down at his mother's feet.

CHAPTER XLVII.

"He has given his life in saving mine. Oh, would that I had died for
thee--my Harold--my Harold!"

This was evermore Olive's cry during the days of awful suspense, when
they knew not but that every hour might be Harold's last. He had broken
a bloodvessel in the lungs; through some violent mental emotion, the
physician said. Nothing else could have produced such results in his
usually strong and manly frame.

"And it was for me--for me!" moaned Olive. "Yet I doubted him--I almost
called him cruel. Oh, that I should never have known his heart until
now!"

Every feeling of womanly shame vanished before the threatening shadow
of death. Night and day, Olive hovered about the door of Harold's room,
listening for any sound. But there was always silence. No one passed in
and out except his mother,--his mother, on whom Olive hardly dared to
look, lest--innocent though she was--she might read reproach in Mrs.
Gwynne's sorrowful eye. Once, she even ventured to hint this.

"I angry, because it was in saving you that this happened to my son? No,
Olive, no! Whatever God sends, we will bear together."

Mrs. Gwynne said this kindly, but her heart seemed frozen to every
thought except one. She rarely quitted Harold's chamber, and scarcely
noticed any person--not even Olive.

One night, or rather early morning, during the time of great crisis, she
came out, and saw Olive standing in the passage, with a face whereon was
written such utter woe, that before it even the mother's sorrow paled.
It seemed to move Mrs. Gwynne deeply.

"My dear, how long have you been here?"

"All night."

"Poor child--poor child!"

"It is all I can do for him and you. If I could only"----

"I guess what you would say. No, no! He must be perfectly quiet; he must
not see or hear _you._" And the mother turned away, as though she had
said too much. But what to Olive was it now to know that Harold loved
her? She would have resigned all the blessing of his love to bring to
him health and life. So crushed, so hopeless was her look, that Harold's
mother pitied her. Thinking a moment, she said:

"He is fast asleep now. If it would comfort you, poor child, to look at
him for one moment