"But you are better now, Travice. You will get well. Thank God!"
"Yes, the danger's over. I feel that, myself. Dear father! how troubled you have been!"
"Travice, I could hardly have borne to lose you," he murmured, leaning over him. "And—thus."
"I shall soon be well again; soon be strong. Be stronger, I hope," and Travice faintly pressed the hand in which his lay, "to go through the duties that lie before me, than I was previously."
Mr. Arkell sighed from the very depths of his heart. If his son could but have looked forward to arise to a life of peace, instead of pain!
Mildred was with the invalid often. Mrs. Dundyke, who, concerned at the imminent danger of one in whom she had always considered that she held a right, had hastened to Westerbury when the news was sent to her, likewise used to go and sit with him. But not Lucy. It was instinctively felt by all that the sight of Lucy could only bring the future more palpably before him. It might have been so different!
Mrs. Dundyke saw Mr. Arkell in private.
"Is there no escape for him?" she asked; "no escape from this marriage with Miss Fauntleroy? I would give all I am worth to effect it."
"And I would give my life," was the agitated answer. "There is none. Honour must be kept before all things. Travice himself knows there is none; neither would he accept any, were it offered out of the line of strict honour."
"It is a life's sacrifice," said Mrs. Dundyke. "It is sacrificing both him and Lucy."