you wish me in this
extremity, Hermy, to do as he advises?"

Herminia bent over him with fierce tears on her eyelids. "O Alan
darling," she cried, "you mustn't die! You mustn't leave me! What
could I do without you? oh, my darling, my darling! But don't
think of me now. Don't think of the dear baby. I couldn't bear to
disturb you even by showing you the telegram. For your sake, Alan,
I'll be calm,--I'll be calm. But oh, not for worlds,--not for
worlds,--even so, would I turn my back on the principles we would
both risk our lives for!"

Alan smiled a faint smile. "Hermy," he said slowly, "I love you
all the more for it. You're as brave as a lion. Oh, how much I
have learned from you!"

All that night and next day Herminia watched by his bedside. Now
and again he was conscious. But for the most part he lay still,
in a comatose condition, with eyes half closed, the whites showing
through the lids, neither moving nor speaking. All the time he
grew worse steadily. As she sat by his bedside, Herminia began to
realize the utter loneliness of her position. That Alan might die
was the one element in the situation she had never even dreamt of.
No wife could love her husband with more perfect devotion than
Herminia loved Alan. She hung upon every breath with unspeakable
suspense and unutterable affection. But the Italian doctor held
out little hope of a rally. Herminia sat there, fixed to the spot,
a white marble statue.

Late next evening Dr. Merrick reached Perugia. He drove straight
from the station to the dingy flat in the morose palazzo. At the
door of his son's room, Herminia met him, clad from head to foot in
white, as she had sat by the bedside. Tears blinded her eyes; her
face was wan; her mien terribly haggard.

"And my son?" the Doctor asked, with a hushed breath of terror.

"He died half an hour ago," Herminia gasped out with an effort.

"But he married you before he died?" the father cried, in a tone of
profound emotion. "He did justice to his child?--he repaired his
evil?"

"He did not," Herminia answered, in a scarcely audible voice. "He
was stanch to the end to his lifelong principles."

"Why not?" the father asked, staggering. "Did he see my telegram?"

"Yes," Herminia answered, numb with grief, yet too proud to
prevaricate. "But I advised him to stand firm; and he abode by my
decision."

The father waved her aside with his hands imperiously. "Then I
have done with you,"