An Encounter.
One swift glance, and then, without noticing Artis, Lydia glided into the room.
She had seen her hope crushed, and that she must never dream again of that happy future. She had not slept, but she had left her post, and while she had been absent another had stolen that last hope.
For, after lying sleeping calmly and peacefully for an hour, Capel heaved a long sigh, and at last he opened his eyes, in a quiet, dreamy way, gazing at, but apparently not seeing, Katrine, as she knelt there in the light cast by the window.
Then she saw a look of intelligence come into his face, and he spoke in a quiet and eager, though feeble tone.
“What is it? Why—why am I here? Don’t—don’t speak. Yes, I know. Oh, Katrine, my love, my love!”
He raised his feeble arms, till they clasped the beautiful neck as she bent down over him, and her head rested upon his pillow, side by side with his; her soft dark hair half hid his pale cheek, and he was whispering feebly his words of gratitude, as Lydia slowly advanced into the room, and, unnoticed by either, she laid her soft, white hand upon Katrine’s shoulder, gripping it with a nervous force of which she herself was ignorant.
Katrine started up, flushed, her eyes sparkling with light, and a look of triumph coming into her face, as she saw who was there.
“Mr Capel’s condition will not permit of this excitement,” said Lydia, in a cold, harsh voice. “Doctor Heston’s orders were that he should be kept quiet.”
That afternoon, when Mr Girtle entered the library, he found a plainly-dressed man awaiting him—a man who, save that he gave the idea of having once been a soldier, might have passed for anything, from a publican to an idler whose wife let lodgings, and made it unnecessary for him to toil or spin.