A smile lighted the pale face of the girl as she faintly responded, "Regulus gave both eyes for his country; I have given but one for my art."
Pressing both hands to my throbbing brow, I asked myself, "Can this be real? Do I dream? If real, why do I not assassinate the fiend? Doctor," said I, "we must move Lucile. I will seek assistance."
"Not so," responded Pollexfen; the excitement of motion might bring on erysipelas, or still worse, tetanus.
A motion from Lucile brought me to her bedside. Taking from beneath her pillow a bank deposit-book, and placing it in my hands, she requested me to hand it to Courtland the moment of his arrival, which she declared would be the 20th, and desire him to read the billet attached to the banker's note of the deposit. "Tell him," she whispered, "not to love me less in my mutilation;" and again she relapsed into unconsciousness.
The photographer now bent over the senseless form of his victim, and muttering, "Yes, carbon in combustion," added, in a softened tone, "Poor girl!" As he lifted his face, I detected a solitary tear course down his impressive features. "The first I have shed," said he, sternly, "since my daughter's death."
Saying nothing, I could only think—"And this wretch once had a child!"
The long night through we stood around her bed. With the dawn, Martha, the housekeeper, returned, and we then learned, for the first time, with what consummate skill Pollexfen had laid all his plans. For even the housekeeper had been sent out of the way, and on a fictitious pretense that she was needed at the bedside of a friend, whose illness was feigned for the occasion. Nor was the day over before we learned with certainty, but no longer with surprise, that Cloudsdale was on his way to Panama, with a bribe in his pocket.
As soon as it was safe to remove Lucile, she was borne on a litter to the hospital of Dr. Peter Smith, where she received every attention that her friends could bestow.
Knowing full well, from what Lucile had told me, that Courtland would be down in the Sacramento boat, I awaited his arrival with the greatest impatience. I could only surmise what would be his course. But judging from my own feelings, I could not doubt that it would be both desperate and decisive.
Finally, the steamer rounded to, and the next moment the pale, emaciated form of the youth sank, sobbing, into my arms. Other tears mingled with his own.