CHAPTER XVI.
"YOU SHALL NEVER WANT FOR A FRIEND."
Up in the third story, poor Edith lay upon her bed, still in an unconscious state.
All the wedding finery had been removed and carried away, and she lay scarcely less white than the spotless robe de nuit she wore, her lips blue and pinched, her eyes sunken and closed.
A physician sat beside her, his fingers upon her pulse, his eyes gravely fixed upon the beautiful, waxen face lying on the pillow.
Two housemaids, looking frightened and anxious, were seated near him, watching him and the still figure on the bed, but ready to obey whatever command he might issue to them.
After introducing his sister to Mrs. Stewart, Emil Correlli had slipped away from the scene of gayety, which had become almost maddening to him, and mounted to that third-story room to inquire again regarding the condition of the girl he had so wronged.
"No better," came the answer, which made him turn with dread, and a terrible fear to take possession of his heart.
What if Edith should never revive? What if she should die in one of these dreadful swoons?
His guilty conscience warned him that he would have been her murderer.