The exposure and wet garments, which Constance had worn during the most critical period of her delirium, had the customary effect. She had been quickly ushered into the house, the wet clothes removed, her limbs and feet chafed by tender hands, and under the influence of a stimulant, and warmly wrapped and in bed, the poor, worn, exhausted soul soon fell asleep. She awoke six hours later in a raging fever.
The doctor had anticipated that something of the kind would happen, and was in the house at the time of her awakening. In so fragile a constitution, weakened by grief and trouble, it was not strange that the fever made prodigious headway, and swiftly reached its height. The crisis arrived several hours after the attack.
She lay very still, apparently on the confines of death. The most profound stillness pervaded the room. The doctor, watch in hand, held her wrist and noted her pulse. Its beat was so feeble that only his experienced fingers could detect it at all. John Thorpe stood at the side of the bed opposite the doctor, bending over and watching her half open lips with an intensity of anxiety impossible to describe. Beside him stood Dorothy, with tears trickling down her face, for the child, though too young to comprehend its meaning, was affected by the solemnity of the scene, and by her aunt’s quiet grief.
Virginia was kneeling at the foot of the bed, her face buried in her hands, in an endeavor to stifle her sobs, while Mrs. Harris looked ruefully out of the window.
Several times the doctor moved only to place his ear close to Constance’s heart, and again he would place his hand there and press gently. Now and again he moistened her lips with a piece of ice and cooled the damp cloth on her hot brow.
At a moment when least expected, she moaned and then her chest heaved with a light breath. Quietly she opened her eyes and looked slowly around. There, before her, stood John and Dorothy. Her eyes rested on them. She recognized them and smiled faintly and said feebly, scarcely above a whisper, “Dorothy, darling, and John!”
“Safe,” announced the doctor, and his face, beaming with confidence, carried joy to the little group of anxious watchers.
CHAPTER XXV.
One day, shortly after Constance had started on the road to recovery, and before she had been removed from “Rosemont” to her home, Virginia, Hazel and Sam were grouped on the piazza discussing in low tones the probable sentence of Rutley and Jack Shore. Sam held the morning paper in his hand, which he casually perused. Virginia was particularly happy and vivacious, and indeed, had she not reason in the reconciliation of John Thorpe and Constance; the rescue of Dorothy; the recovery by Constance of her reason, so threatening and dire in its flight, and the passing of that awful consuming fever that had seized upon the frail mind and body of Constance—was productive of such devout and fervent gladness that she felt at peace with the world. Even that old bitterness, so virulent and overpowering toward Corway, had gone out from her heart completely, and as she pondered on his sudden disappearance, the thought that he may have come to a violent death caused tears to spring into her beautiful eyes. It was a mute but an inexpressibly sad testimony to the final closing of love’s first dream.
At that moment Sam exclaimed, “Well, what do you think of this?” and then he looked over the paper and grinned at Hazel knowingly.