Terrified beyond measure, Jerrie put her hand over Maude's mouth and said, almost sharply:
"If you want to live you must not talk. Be careful and you will get well, the doctor says so."
But Jerrie's fears belied her words when she saw the pallor in Maude's face as she sank back upon her pillow exhausted, while, with her handkerchief she wiped a faint coloring of blood from her lips.
"I have staid too long," Jerrie said, as she arose from her seat by the couch. Then Maude spoke again in a whisper:
"Send Harold soon."
"I will," Jerrie replied, and kissing the death-like face she went softly from the room, thinking to herself, as she descended the stairs, "I believe I could give Harold to her now."
CHAPTER XXXIV.
UNDER THE PINES WITH TOM.
JERRIE found Tom just where she had left him, on the piazza outside, waiting for her, it would seem, for the moment she appeared he arose, and going with her down the steps walked by her side along the avenue toward the point where she would turn aside into the road which led to the cottage.