July—August passed—the middle of September came. All this time, whatever the weather, she never once missed her "shadow" from his post. As we grow accustomed to all things, she grew accustomed to this watchful care, grew to look for him when the day's work was done. But in the middle of September she missed him. Evening after evening came, and she returned home unfollowed and alone. Something had happened.
Yes, something had happened. He had never really held up his head after that second parting with Edith. For days he had lain prostrate, so near to death that they thought death surely must come. But by the end of a week he was better—as much better at least as he ever would be in this world.
"Victor," his aunt would cry out, "I wish—I wish you would consult a physician about this affection of the heart. I am frightened for you—it is not like anything else. There is this famous German—do go to see him to please me."
"To please you, my dear aunt—my good, patient nurse—I would do much," her nephew was wont to answer with a smile. "Believe me your fears are groundless, however. Death takes the hopeful and happy, and passes by such wretches as I am. It all comes of weakness of body and depression of mind; there's nothing serious the matter. If I get worse, you may depend upon it, I'll go and consult Herr Von Werter."
Then it was that he began his nightly duty—the one joy left in his joyless life. Lady Helena and Inez returned to St. John's Wood. And Sir Victor, from his lodgings in Fenton's Hotel, followed his wife home every evening. It was his first thought when he arose in the morning, the one hope that upheld him all the long, weary, aimless day—the one wild delight that was like a spasm, half pain, half joy—when the dusk fell to see her slender figure come forth, to follow his darling, himself unseen, as he fancied, to her humble home. To watch near it, to look up at her lighted windows with eyes full of such love and longing as no words can ever picture, and then, shivering in the rising night wind, to hail a hansom and go home—to live only in the thought of another meeting on the morrow.
Whatever the weather, it has been said, he went. On many occasions he returned drenched through, with chattering teeth and livid lips. Then would follow long, fever-tossed, sleepless nights, and a morning of utter prostration, mental and physical.
But come what might, while he was able to stand, he must return to his post—to his wife.
But Nature, defied long, claimed her penalty at last. There came a day when Sir Victor could rise from his bed no more, when the heart spasms, in their anguish, grew even more than his resolute will could bear. A day when in dire alarm Lady Helena and Inez were once more summoned by faithful Jamison, and when at last—at last the infallible German doctor was sent for.
The interview between physician and patient was long and strictly private. When Herr Von Werter went away at last his phlegmatic Teuton face was set with an unwonted expression of pity and pain. After an interval of almost unendurable suspense, Lady Helena was sent for by her nephew, to be told the result. He lay upon a low sofa, wheeled near the window. The last light of the September day streamed in and fell full upon his face—perhaps that was what glorified it and gave it such a radiant look. A faint smile lingered on his lips, his eyes had a far-off, dreamy look, and were fixed on the rosy evening sky. A strange, unearthly, exalted look altogether, that made his aunt's heart sink like stone.
"Well?" She said it in a tense sort of whisper, longing for, yet dreading, the reply. He turned to her, that smile still on his lips, still in his eyes. He had not looked so well for months. He took her hand.