With relays at every post-house, she reached London the next night, and, weary and terrified, drove at once to the small hostelry where Hyde lay. There was a soldier sitting outside his chamber-door, but the wounded man was quite alone when Katherine entered. She took in at a glance the bare, comfortless room, scarcely lit by the sputtering rush-candle, and the rude bed, and the burning cheeks of the fevered man upon it.
"Katherine!" he cried; and his voice was as weak and as tearful as that of a troubled child.
"Here come I, my dear one."
"I do not deserve it. I have been so wicked, and you my pure good wife."
"See, then, I have had no temptations, but thou hast lived in the midst of great ones. Then, how natural and how easy was it for thee to do wrong!"
"Oh, how you love me, Katherine!"
"God knows."
"And for this wrong you will not forsake me?"