ing draughts, could win from him more
than a few measured words of thankfulness, such as he would probably have
uttered to any other woman on earth who had performed these particular
services for him.

'Dear, dear James,' she said one day, bending her face upon the bed in an
excess of emotion. 'How you have suffered! It has been too cruel. I am
more glad you are getting better than I can say. I have prayed for
it--and I am sorry for what I have done; I am innocent of the worst,
and--I hope you will not think me so very bad, James!'

'Oh no. On the contrary, I shall think you very good--as a nurse,' he
answered, the caustic severity of his tone being apparent through its
weakness.

Laura let fall two or three silent tears, and said no more that day.

Somehow or other Signor Smithozzi seemed to be making good his escape. It
transpired that he had not taken a passage in either of the suspected
coaches, though he had certainly got out of the county; altogether, the
chance of finding him was problematical.

Not only did Captain Northbrook survive his injuries, but it soon
appeared that in the course of a few weeks he would find himself little
if any the worse for the catastrophe. It could also be seen that Laura,
while secretly hoping for her husband's forgiveness for a piece of folly
of which she saw the enormity more clearly every day, was in great doubt
as to what her future relations with him would be. Moreover, to add to
the complication, whilst she, as a runaway wife, was unforgiven by her
husband, she and her husband, as a runaway couple, were unforgiven by her
father, who had never once communicated with either of them since his
departure from the inn. But her immediate anxiety was to win the pardon
of her husband, who possibly might be bearing in mind, as he lay upon his
couch, the familiar words of Brabantio, 'She has deceived her father, and
may thee.'

Matters went on thus till Captain Northbrook was able to walk about. He
then removed with his wife to quiet apartments on the south coast, and
here his recovery was rapid. Walking up the cliffs one day, supporting
him by her arm as usual, she said to him, simply, 'James, if I go on as I
am going now, and always attend to your smallest want, and never think of
anything but devotion to you, will you--try to like me a little?'

'It is a thing I must carefully consider,' he said, with the same gloomy
dryness which characterized all his words to her no