She paused; for the dim eye of the victim, as it rested upon her, grew suddenly bright.
"Cephyse!" murmured Jacques; "is it you?"
"Yes, it is I," answered she, in a voice of deep emotion; "who have come—I will tell you—"
She was unable to continue, and, as she clasped her hands together, her pale, agitated, tearful countenance expressed her astonishment and despair at the mortal change which had taken place in the features of Jacques. He understood the cause of her surprise, and as he contemplated, in his turn, the suffering and emaciated countenance of Cephyse, he said to her, "Poor girl! you also have had to bear much grief, much misery—I should hardly have known you."
"Yes," replied Cephyse, "much grief—much misery—and worse than misery," she added, trembling, whilst a deep blush overspread her pale features.
"Worse than misery?" said Jacques, astonished.
"But it is you who have suffered," hastily resumed Cephyse, without answering her lover.
"Just now, I was going to make an end of it—your voice has recalled me for an instant—but I feel something here," and he laid his hand upon his breast, "which never gives quarter. It is all the same now—I have seen you—I shall die happy."
"You shall not die, Jacques; I am here—"
"Listen to one, my girl. If I had a bushel of live coal in my stomach, it could hardly burn me more. For more than a month, I have been consuming my body by a slow fire. This gentleman," he added, glancing at Morok, "this dear friend, always undertook to feed the flame. I do not regret life; I have lost the habit of work, and taken to drink and riot; I should have finished by becoming a thorough blackguard: I preferred that my friend here should amuse himself with lighting a furnace in my inside. Since what I drank just now, I am certain that it fumes like yonder punch."