He knelt at her side, and the lips of both moved in prayer. When he rose, she laid her little hand, all purple with fever, in his and said:
"Brother--when I am gone, bury me in that beautiful valley near the spring, where the wild flowers grow close by the white stone. On the stone write: 'Here lies my beloved sister, Blanche Holmes.'"
An hour later John Stevens knelt beside a corpse. The gentle spirit had flown.
Midnight--and the castaway, despairing, half-crazed with grief, still knelt by the dead body, tearing his hair, and groaning:
"Alone--left alone!"
CHAPTER XIV.
THE TREASURE SHIP.
"O gentle wind ('tis thus she sings)
That blowest to the west,