"Oliver, darling!"
He passed his hand over her hair.
"I have been waiting for you--it is our wedding night."
She hid her face against him.
"Oh! you angel!" he murmured to her--"angel of consolation! When I am gone, say to yourself: 'I drew him out of the pit, and helped him to die'; say 'he suffered, and I forgave him everything'; say 'he was my husband, and I carried him on my heart--so.'" He moved toward her. She put her arms under his head and drew him to her breast, stooping over him and kissing him.
So the first part of the night went by, he very much under the influence of morphia and not in pain; murmured words passing at intervals between them, the outward signs of an inward and ineffable bond. Often, as she sat motionless beside him, the thought of her mother stirred in her heart--father, mother, husband--close, close all of them--"closer than hands and feet"--one with her and one with God.
About two o'clock she gave him the new drug, he piteously consenting for her sake. Then in a mortal terror she resumed her place beside him. In a few minutes surely the pain, the leaping hungry pain would be upon him, and she must see him wrestle with it defenceless. She sat holding her breath, all existence gathered into fear.
But the minutes passed. She felt the tension of his hand relax. He went to sleep so gently that in her infinite relief she too dropped into sleep, her head beside his, the black hair mingling with the gray on the same pillow.
The servant coming in, as he had been told, looked at them in astonishment, and stole away again.
An hour or so later Oliver woke.