Tarbot gave a laugh.
“My heart!” he cried. “It is out of your reach—high as the heavens it is above you, or low as hell beneath you, whichever simile you like best. It can never be yours. Did you say I should wake in three hours?”
“In three hours,” she answered quietly. “Don’t turn your eyes from me—keep looking at me.”
“Your eyes are big and bright—wonderfully bright. There is a flash of sea-green in them. Now, Barbara’s eyes are brown with golden lights—yours are green and icy cold. How sleepy I feel. No, you will never have my heart—but folly! I won’t give way to this.”
The next instant his eyes closed, and he was in a sound and childlike slumber.
Clara looked at him with a grim smile on her face.
“I believe I shall win him yet,” she murmured. “If so, beware, little Piers Pelham!”
CHAPTER XXIII.
WITH THE DOCTORS.
Barbara received Mrs. Tarbot’s letter by the first post in the morning. She read the contents and determined to act on Clara’s counsel at once. Pelham was just getting up when his wife appeared.
“Dear, how bad you look!” said Barbara, giving him a glance of mingled apprehension and affection.