“Forever!” said she, stooping down and kissing his forehead. The next moment she was gone.
“Come, Conway,” said the doctor, “cheer up, my good fellow; you 'll be all right in a week or so. You 've got something worth living for, too, if all accounts be true.”
“More than you think for, doctor,” said Conway, heartily,—“far more than you think for.”
“The lawyer talks of a peerage and a fine estate.”
“Far more than that,” cried Conway; “a million times better.”
The surgeon turned a look of half apprehension on the sick man, and, gently closing the shutters, he withdrew.
Dark as was that room, and silent as it was, what blissful hopes and blessed anticipations crowded and clustered around that low “sick-bed”! What years of happiness unfolded themselves before that poor brain, which no longer felt a pang, save in the confusion of its bright imaginings! How were wounds forgotten and sufferings unminded in those hours wherein a whole future was revealed!
At last he fell off to sleep, and to dream of a fair white hand that parted the hair upon his forehead, and then gently touched his feverish cheek. Nor was it all a dream; she was at his bedside.