“He is here yet. He can be summoned in a minute.”
Then she cried out in alarm:
“Fair!”
The girl’s face had sunk down among the bedclothes, but at that cry she lifted it wearily, and Mrs. Howard went on:
“You heard what Bayard said? He wishes the marriage to take place at once. Of course, you are willing?”
To her amazement, the girl answered, in a voice fraught with agony:
“Oh, no, no, no, it cannot be—it cannot be! Oh, Heaven pity me and strike me dead this moment, that I may not have to bear my misery any longer.”
Mrs. Howard believed that she was foreboding her lover’s death, and tried to soothe her with hopeful words:
“He is going to get well, I feel sure, dear, but he wishes to marry you now that you may help to nurse him back to life. Come, we will go and explain to our friends, and then the interrupted ceremony may go on.”
“Not now—I cannot marry him now,” moaned the girl despairingly, and her wounded lover, looking on, was so amazed that he could not speak.