oved by the passions, the feelings, and the
weaknesses of ordinary humanity. He saw and shuddered.

Thin and pale and wan, she now stood before him, tottering feebly
with unsteady step, and staying herself on the arm of her maid. Her
cheeks, which, when he last saw them, were full and rounded with the
outlines of youth and health, were now hollow and sunken. Around her
eyes were those dark clouded marks which are the sure signs of
weakness and disease. Her hands, as they grasped the arms of the
maid, were thin and white and emaciated. Her lips were bloodless. It
was the face of Hilda, indeed, but Hilda in sorrow, in suffering, and
in grief--such a face as he had never imagined. But there were some
things in that face which belonged to the Hilda of old, and had not
changed. The eyes still flashed dark and piercing; they at least had
not failed; and still their penetrating gaze rested upon him with no
diminution in their power. Still the rich masses of ebon hair
wreathed themselves in voluminous folds, and from out the luxuriant
black masses of that hair the white face looked forth with its pallor
rendered more awful from the contrast. Yet now that white face was a
face of agony, and the eyes which, in their mute entreaty, were
turned toward him, were fixed and staring. As he came up to her she
grasped his arm; her lips moved; but for a time no audible sound
escaped. At length she spoke, but it was in a whisper:

"_Is he alive_?"

And that was all that she said. She stood there panting, and gasping
for breath, awaiting his reply with a certain awful suspense.

"Yes, my lady," said Gualtier, in a kind of bewilderment, as though
he had not yet got over the shock of such an apparition. "He is alive
yet."

"God be thanked!" moaned Hilda, in a low voice. "I have arrived in
time--at last. He must be saved--and he shall be saved. Come."

She spoke this last word to Gualtier. By her words, as well as by her
face and manner, he saw that some great change had come over her, but
why it was, he knew not yet. He plainly perceived, however, that she
had turned from her purpose, and now no longer desired the death of
the man whom she had commissioned him to destroy. In that moment of
hurried thought he wondered much, but, from his knowledge of the
recent past, he made a conjecture which was not far from the truth.

"Come," said Hilda. "I have something to say to you. I wish to see
you alone. Come."

And he followed her into th