"You are sure of this, doctor? Sure, mind! I won't last the week out?"
"It is impossible, Sir Victor. I always tell my patients the truth. Your disease is beyond the reach of all earthly skill. The end may come at any moment—in no case can you survive the week."
His serene face did not change. He turned to his aunt with a smile that was often on his lips now:
"At last," he said softly; "at last my darling may come to me—at last I may tell her all. Thank God for this hour of release. Aunt Helena, send for Edith at once."
By the night train, a few hours later, Inez Catheron went up to London. As Madame Mirebeau's young women assembled next morning, she was there before them, waiting to see Miss Stuart.
Edith came—a foreknowledge of the truth in her mind. The interview was brief. She left at once in company with Miss Catheron, and Madame Mirebeau's establishment was to know her no more.
As the short, autumnal day closed in, they were in Cheshire.
It was the evening of the second of October—the anniversary of the bridal eve. And thus at last the bride was coming home. She looked out with eyes that saw nothing of the familiar landscape as it flitted by—the places she had never thought to see more. She was going to Catheron Royals, to the man she had married a year ago. A year ago! what a strange, terrible year it had been—like a bad dream. She shuddered as she recalled it. All was to be told at last, and death was to set all things even. The bride was returning to the bridegroom like this.
All the way from the station to the great house she never spoke a word. Her heart beat with a dull, heavy pain—pity for him—dread of what she was to hear. It was quite dark when they rolled through the lofty gates, up the broad, tree-shaded drive, to the grand portico entrance of the house.
"He is very low this evening, miss," Jamison whispered as he admitted them; "feverish and longing for her ladyship's coming. He begs that as soon as my lady is rested and has had some refreshment she will come to him at once."