Once in awhile a servant or the clerk, in passing through the upper hall late at night, thought they heard a low sobbing and moaning in their rooms, but they had been told something of the invalid’s infirmity, and so gave themselves no uneasiness upon the subject.
And so right there in the very midst of the great city, with the detectives at work all about them, and the excitement that the deep mystery was creating, this great wrong was being perpetrated; and had it not been for Earle Wayne’s strange whim to change his hotel upon that particular night, when the house was so full, and madam’s “son” absent, the story of Editha’s remarkable disappearance and rescue would never have been related.
When Editha awoke, after two hours of undisturbed refreshing sleep, she found Earle still sitting beside her, and her former attendant, with her face buried in her hands, sitting in sullen silence upon the lounge opposite.
“I did not dream it, then?” she said, looking up into her lover’s face with a long-drawn, trembling sigh.
“No, my darling; you have slept too soundly to dream of anything. Are you rested?” he asked, bending down to kiss the sweet quivering lips.
“Yes; but, oh! Earle, don’t let him come back again,” she pleaded, with a shudder, as she reached out her thin hand and grasped his with nervous strength.
He bent his lips to her ear, and whispered:
“No, my own; he is safely locked within the next room, and he can never hurt you again. Bring some more of that drink,” he added, addressing the woman opposite.
She arose and obeyed, and Editha drank as eagerly as before.