"Merciful heaven!" gasped Romaine; "it is Loyd's voice! Something dreadful has occurred! Oh, prove yourself my protector, and come with me! Come, quick, quick!"
In the excitement of the moment, the brooding twilight, and their unfamiliarity with the house they lost much precious time. Indeed they were only guided at last to the grim little office by the sudden opening of a door through which the figure of a woman escaped and passed them in swift flight.
And then they entered in awed silence, to find the bridegroom sitting in the gloaming of his nuptial-day with pendent arms and sunken head, lost—
"In that blessed mood,
In which the burden of the mystery,
In which the heavy and the weary weight
Of all this unintelligible world,
Is lightened!"
THE END.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Copyrighted, 1889, Belford, Clarke & Co.
Transcriber's Notes:
"The Cost of Things" (bottom of P. 513): the original appears to be missing content after ["the fallacy of a popular delusion--that"] (an apparent printer's error). Unable to locate alternate publication of this article in order to identify and replace missing text. An ellipsis has been added to indicate the incomplete statement.