"And can it be that she is going to pull through?"
My wife's face went down into her hands. "O, no—no. She's dying now— dying in Senda's arms!"
Her ear, quicker than mine, heard some sign within and she left me. But she was back almost at once, whispering:
"She knows you're here, and says she has a message to her husband which she can give only to you."
We gazed into each other's eyes. "Go in," she said.
As I entered, Senda tenderly disengaged herself, went out, and closed the door.
I drew near in silence and she began at once to speak, bidding me take the chair Senda had left, and with a tender smile thanking me for coming.
Then she said faintly and slowly, but with an unfaltering voice, "I want you to know one or two things so that if it ever should be my husband's affliction to find out how foolish and undutiful I have been, you can tell them to him. Tell him my wrongdoing was, from first to last, almost totally—almost totally——"
"Do you mean—intangible?"
"Yes, yes, intangible. Then if he should say that the intangible part is the priceless part—the life, the beauty, the very essence of the whole matter—isn't it strange that we women are slower than men to see that— tell him I saw it, saw it and confessed it when for his sake I was slipping away from him by stealth out of life up to my merciful Judge.