“Ah; that’s his last!”
“Take her away,” said the doctor, as Ruth fell heavily across her husband’s body; and the unresisting form of the insensible wife was borne into the next room.
Strange hands closed Harry’s eyes, parted his damp locks, straightened his manly limbs, and folded the marble hands over as noble a heart as ever lay cold and still beneath a shroud.
CHAPTER XXIX.
“It is really quite dreadful to see her in this way,” said Hyacinth, as they chafed Ruth’s hands and bathed her temples; “it is really quite dreadful. Somebody ought to tell her, when she comes to, that her hair is parted unevenly and needs brushing sadly. Harry’s finely-chiseled features look quite beautiful in repose. It is a pity the barber should have been allowed to shave off his beard after death; it looked quite oriental and picturesque. But the sight of Ruth, in this way, is really dreadful; it quite unnerves me. I shall look ten years older by to-morrow. I must go down and take a turn or two on the piazza.” And Hyacinth paced up and down, thinking—not of the bereaved sister, who lay mercifully insensible to her loss, nor yet of the young girl whose heart was to throb trustfully at the altar, by his side, on the morrow,—but of her broad lands and full coffers, with which he intended to keep at bay the haunting creditors, who were impertinent enough to spoil his daily digestion by asking for their just dues.
One o’clock! The effect of the sleeping potion administered to Ruth had passed away. Slowly she unclosed her eyes and gazed about her. The weary nurse, forgetful of her charge, had sunk into heavy slumber.
Where was Harry?
Ruth presses her hands to her temples. Oh God! the consciousness that would come! the frantic out-reaching of the arms to clasp—a vain shadow!