When Mary woke she found her husband sitting by her bedside, with the light of such a great joy in his eyes, that a glad wonder at once came into her own. She felt that some very happy thing must have come to pa.s.s, and she raised herself in the bed, and, taking his hand in hers, she gazed expectantly into his face.

"Mary, I have some very good news indeed for you," he said gently but very earnestly.

"I knew it! I knew it!" she exclaimed, trembling violently.

"Mary, can you bear to hear it now?--how do you feel?"

"Oh, now--now!" she cried vehemently. "Tell it to me now, at once, before I go away again. Oh! Harry--you don't understand--sometimes the whole world seems to slip away from me. I feel as if my soul was being carried right away into some dark place--and I leave memory and love and everything but sensation behind me--I cannot think then, Harry. Tell me quick, for I can understand now. Tell me at once, or the darkness will come again, and it will be too late!"

"My darling! my darling! The darkness will never come to you again.

Mary, dear, listen to me. I know your secret, and your enemies can never trouble you more."

She pa.s.sed her hand across her brow several times, then said in a feeble puzzled voice, "You cannot know all, or you would hate me."

"I do know all, and I love you more than ever!" he exclaimed pa.s.sionately as he put his arms about her and kissed her.

She hid her head on his breast and sobbed in the fulness of her great joy.

"Mary," he continued, "you need no longer fear Susan Riley's plots. She will never molest you again. And who do you think is the friend who has saved us? It is Mrs. King--she is coming to see you to-morrow."

Gradually he told her all that Catherine King had revealed to him. At first she could not bring herself to believe that this was more than a very happy dream; she feared she would awake again soon and find herself in the presence of the shadow. But before he left her, she had realized all that had happened on that day; and with tears and inarticulate prayers of grat.i.tude to the G.o.d who had not deserted her, she relieved her o'er-wrought spirit, until a sweet sleep closed her weary eyes.

Catherine King called as she had promised on the following afternoon.

"How is she? Shall I be able to see her?" she asked anxiously, as soon as the doctor came into the room.

"Mary is very much better. Indeed there is very little the matter with her now," he replied. "But I wish to say a few words to you before we go upstairs. Mrs. King, I have had a long talk with Mary about you. My dear friend!--I hope you will allow me to call you that now--we have decided that you are to stay with us; you must live here with Mary. She insists on it. You know how she loves you--it will be cruel of you to refuse. It has been settled that you are not to leave us even this night. The weather is very bad, and you are too ill to be out in it. Indeed you must be looked after. A room has been got ready for you, and to-morrow you can give up your lodgings. No! No refusal! I am your doctor now, and my orders are peremptory. You will be happy yet and live long with us."

She shook her head and smiled. "I will not trouble you long. But oh, Dr.

Duncan!" and she stooped and kissed his hand in the fervour of her grat.i.tude, "I thank you from my heart for what you have done this day.

Oh, generous man! I have not deserved this kindness. I have done much wrong to Mary and you, and yet you forgive me like this. Ah! if a dying woman's true grat.i.tude be of any good, you indeed have it now."

Catherine followed the doctor upstairs. Mary was slightly hysterical at first with the excitement of the meeting. She put her arms round Catherine's neck and cried, "Oh, mother! dear mother! You too! you too!

and I loved you so. But you have forgiven me now, and you will not hurt my baby, my poor little baby!"

Catherine wept. Her heart had been softened by her lonely misery of the last few months--she wept, and stooping she kissed Mary's forehead and said, "My darling, I will love your baby, even as I love you."

Mary soon entirely recovered her health. This was her last shock. The terror was no more, the shadow had disappeared for ever; and the knowledge that there was now no secret between her husband and herself, removed the last cloud from her mind. She went through life with him along a smoother way, a happy wife and mother.

But Catherine's health grew rapidly worse. Soon she was confined to her bed, peacefully, painlessly, fading away, and Mary nursed her.

Her last days were made even delicious to her by the love of her two friends. She was very happy in that she had saved Mary, happier than she had ever been before--even in the old time when she had been drunk with the glory of her visionary scheme. She had learned at last that highest, intensest of pleasures--self-sacrifice for those we love. No shadow came across the glory of those last bright days. She was so grateful, so full of love, so peacefully happy, and at last she died even as a saint might have died with Mary by her side.

The n.o.ble, erring soul had gone to find Divine mercy. Her last words were, as she turned her eyes to Mary with a wistful look, "Mary! I feel that I know nothing about it, it is all a mystery. But it may be that there is another world, the other side--pray for me, Mary! pray for me!

I cannot pray for myself; for if there is another world I do so want to meet you again there, my darling! my darling! but it is all a mystery--all a mystery. Kiss me, Mary!"

The funeral of Mrs. King took place on one wild winter's day. Dr. Duncan accompanied it as the only mourner. But on reaching the cemetery he perceived there a woman dressed in black and closely veiled.

She stood by the grave as the coffin was being lowered, and was evidently weeping bitterly.

He wondered who she could be, but she carefully concealed her face, and went away without disclosing her ident.i.ty.

It was the boarding-house keeper of Bayswater, Sister Eliza, of the Secret Society, who, after much vain search, had only two days before discovered where her beloved Chief had gone.

THE END.