He put out his hand and clasped one of hers in his feeble grasp.
"Only you--only you--I thought you had left me."
"Hush!--you must not speak much," she said, arranging the bed-clothes.
"I have had a dream," whispered the invalid fearfully, "a strange dream--that I was in the coils of a serpent, being crushed to death. But a woman suddenly appeared, and at her touch the serpent vanished and I was free. The woman had your face, Cecilia."
"Hush!--do not speak more--you are too weak--you are in safety now, and no serpent shall touch you while I am by your side."
"You will be my wife?"
"I will be your wife," she replied softly. "I have loved you from the first day I met you, but never thought you would be burdened with such a useless thing as I."
"Not useless, dear. How could I have been so foolish as not to have understood your love before? Thank God for this illness, that has opened my eyes. You have saved my life--my soul."
He stopped, through exhaustion, and lay silently upon his pillow, watching the red flare of the fire glimmer on the pale face of the blind girl. A great feeling of joy and thankfulness came over him, as he felt that all the stormy, tempestuous life of the past was over at last--and beside him sat the one woman who could save his weak nature from yielding to the temptations of the world.