Victoriano was so depressed that he felt a presentiment of never more seeing Clarence. He looked at the two horses as if they were a last token of his friendship, and he hurried out of the stable and out of town quickly, to be alone with the silent moon and his own thoughts; his thoughts of Alice, of Clarence and Mercedes going with him, as he drove home. But Victoriano's thoughts of those three interesting persons were shared by many others.
Don Mariano and Doña Josefa sat by Mercedes' bedside. Her heavy slumber began to alarm them. She lay motionless, with closed eyelids, but she was not sleeping, for she would open her eyes when they spoke to her.
About midnight Doña Josefa asked her if she had been sleeping. She shook her head and whispered:
“I am waiting for Clarence. He is coming, sitting on a water lily. I see him. I am waiting.”
The look of dismay that Doña Josefa exchanged with her husband, revealed to each other their terrible anxiety and dread.
“We must wait for Victoriano, and if Clarence does not come, then we must send for a doctor,” Don Mariano whispered.
But Mercedes heard him, and said, scarcely audibly: “He will come. I am waiting. He loves me. He don't want to kill me.”
When Victoriano arrived it was near daylight, but Don Mariano was up and came out to meet him. Seeing the phæton with only one occupant, he knew the sad truth. Victoriano gave him Clarence's letter, which he read with the keenest regret, feeling that if he had stayed at home, as Mercedes had begged, Clarence would not have felt compelled to go, but would have been made happy under that roof, as he deserved to be. Vain regrets now. He was gone, and there was nothing to be done but wait until he arrived at San Francisco. It would only be a matter of three days, Don Mariano tried to argue to himself, but the experiences of the last two days had taught him how much mischief might be effected in a very short space of time.
When he returned to Mercedes' room he found that she was sleeping, but her sleep was restless, and now a high fever had set in. Her cheeks were like red roses, and her pulse beat with telegraphic velocity. She moaned and moved her head, as if it pained her, but did not awake. It was evident that a doctor must be sent for immediately.
Victoriano never drove or rode past Darrell's house without looking at a certain window next to that of Clarence's room. As he came from town now, before driving into the court of his own house, he looked towards the well-known window. His heart beat with alarm, seeing a light through the shutters. Alice must be ill, he thought, and that light has been burning all night. The lover's heart had guessed the truth. Alice was ill with a raging fever, and when daylight came, instead of the fever passing off, as Mrs. Darrell had hoped, she became delirious.