urse--kind-faced and competent--beside him, lay his recovered son,
deeply and pathetically asleep. For in his sleep the piteous head
movement had ceased, and he might have passed for a very delicate child
of twelve, who would soon wake like other children to a new summer day.

Into Buntingford's strained consciousness there fell a drop of balm as he
sat beside him, listening to the quiet breathing, and comforted by the
mere peace of the slight form.

He looked up at Cynthia and thanked her; and Cynthia's heart sang for
joy.

CHAPTER XIV

The Alcotts' unexpected guest lingered another forty-eight hours under
their roof,--making a hopeless fight for life. But the influenza poison,
recklessly defied from the beginning, had laid too deadly a grip on an
already weakened heart. And the excitement of the means she had taken to
inform herself as to the conditions of Buntingford's life and
surroundings, before breaking in upon them, together with the exhaustion
of her night wandering, had finally destroyed her chance of recovery.
Buntingford saw her whenever the doctors allowed. She claimed his
presence indeed, and would not be denied. But she talked little more; and
in her latest hours it seemed to those beside her both that the desire to
live had passed, and that Buntingford's attitude towards her had, in the
end, both melted and upheld her. On the second night after her arrival,
towards dawn she sent for him. She then could not speak. But her right
hand made a last motion towards his. He held it, till Ramsay who had his
fingers on the pulse of the left, looked up with that quiet gesture which
told that all was over. Then he himself closed her eyes, and stooping, he
kissed her brow--

"_Pardonnons--nous! Adieu_!" he said, under his breath, in the language
familiar to their student youth together. Then he went straight out of
the room, and through the dewy park, and misty woods already vocal with
the awakening birds; he walked back to Beechmark, and for some hours shut
himself into his library, where no one disturbed him.

When he emerged it was with the air of a man turning to a new chapter in
life. Geoffrey French was still with him. Otherwise the big house was
empty and seemed specially to miss the sounds of Helena's voice, and
tripping feet. Buntingford enquired about her at once, and Geoffrey was
able to produce a letter from Mrs. Friend describing the little Welsh
Inn, near the pass of Aberglasslyn, where th