ing him with all the power I had to set me free; but he
was harder than iron. Just at the end, when he had the door open, and was
leaving me, telling me that I had lost my last chance, and would never
see him again, I clung about him with one wild desperate cry. He flung me
back into the room violently, and shut the door in my face. I fancied
afterwards that that cry must have been heard, and that, if there had
been any creature in the house inclined to help me, there would have come
an end to my sufferings. But the time passed, and there was no change;
only the long dreary days, the wretched sleepless nights."

This was all. There were details of her sufferings which Marian told her
faithful friend by-and-by, when her mind was calmer, and they had leisure
for tranquil talk; but the story was all told; and Marian lay down to
rest in the familiar room, unspeakably grateful to God for her rescue,
and only eager that her husband should be informed of her safety. She had
not yet been told that he had crossed the Atlantic in search of her,
deluded by a false scent. Ellen feared to tell her this at first; and she
had taken it for granted that John Saltram was still in London. It was
easy to defer any explanation just yet, on account of Marian's weakness.
The exertion of telling the brief story of her sufferings had left her
prostrate; and she was fain to obey her friendly nurse.

"We will talk about everything, and arrange everything, by-and-by, dear
Mrs. Holbrook," Ellen said resolutely; "but for the present you _must_
rest, and you must take everything that I bring you, and be very good."

And with that she kissed and left her, to perform another and less
agreeable duty--the duty of attendance by her husband's sick-bed.

CHAPTER XLV.

MR. WHITELAW MAKES HIS WILL.

They had carried Stephen Whitelaw to the Grange; and he lay a helpless
creature, beyond hope of recovery, in one of the roomy old-fashioned
bed-chambers.

The humble Crosber surgeon had done his best, and had done it skilfully,
being a man of large experience amongst a lowly class of sufferers; and
to the aid of the Crosber surgeon had come a more prosperous practitioner
from Malsham, who had driven over in his own phaeton; but between them
both they could make nothing of Stephen Whitelaw. His race was run. He
had been severely burnt; and if his actual injuries were not enough to
kill him, there was little chance that he could survive the shock which