The rude laugh caused by this remark had hardly subsided, when hasty footsteps were heard running along overhead.
"Oh! here he comes, at last. Well, Jorian, what is to do now up there?"
CHAPTER XVII
JORIAN KETEL went straight to Margaret's room, and there, to his infinite surprise, he found the man he had been in search of, pale and motionless, his head in Margaret's lap, and she kneeling over him, mute now, and stricken to stone. Her eyes were dilated, yet glazed, and she neither saw the light nor heard the man, nor cared for anything on earth, but the white face in her lap.
Jorian stood awe-struck, the candle shaking in his hand.
"Why, where was he, then, all the time?"
Margaret heeded him not. Jorian went to the empty chest and inspected it. He began to comprehend. The girl's dumb and frozen despair moved him.
"This is a sorry sight," said he: "it is a black night's work: all for a few skins! Better have gone with us than so. She is past answering me, poor wench. Stop—let us try whether—"
He took down a little round mirror, no bigger than his hand, and put it to Gerard's mouth and nostrils, and held it there. When he withdrew it it was dull.