On a small table beside the bed lay her Bible (Santley knew it well; it was a present from himself, with his own name written on the flyleaf), and a waxen taper, unlighted. Lying on the coverlet, close to her fingers, was a wreath of immortelles.
And through the window, which was left open at the top to admit the pure air, came again, wafted by the wind, the low, dreadful tolling of the chapel bell.
Toll! toll!
Haldane stood close by the bedside, not looking at his wife, but always keeping his stern eyes fixed upon the clergyman. Step by step, horrified yet fascinated, Santley crept nearer and nearer to the bed, his eyes dilated, his face even more ghastly than the face on which he gazed. He noticed everything—the marble features, the folded hands, the closed eyes beneath their waxen lids; he felt in his nostrils the sick perfume of death.
Then, overmastered by the piteous sight, he raised his arms wildly in the air, uttered a cry of anguish and despair, and fell, moaning and sobbing, on his knees by the bedside.
CHAPTER XXXVIII. TORTURE AND CONFESSION.
For some minutes he remained kneeling, his strong frame shaken by deep sobs, his lips murmuring some incoherent prayer. Then he felt a touch upon the shoulder. He looked up, shuddering. “Come!” said Haldane, looking darkly down upon him.
“No, no!” he cried, in the extremity of his agitation. “Let me stay here! Let me pray by her side a little while!”