contemplation."
All three retired; the door, which had been provided with another key, was securely locked, and she was left again in her loneliness and bitter sorrow.
Weak and weary with her long journey and unbroken fast she lay still, her limbs aching with fatigue and her heart almost broken with sorrow.
Her momentary glimpse of her dear ones had filled her heart with a wild flood of new tenderness for them. She had come back to them from the dead, and she felt that they would have been filled with the deepest joy in receiving her again.
She had been so cruelly torn from them in the very moment when they first caught sight of her! She wondered what they would think.
"Perhaps they will share old Willis' delusion that it was a spirit," thought she, with a flood of tears.
She had almost forgotten Fanny in the bitter anguish of being retaken thus in the very moment of impending re-union with her family.
But presently she heard the clank of the poor captive's chain, as she turned restlessly on her hard bed, and caught the sound of her groans.
"Poor Fanny," she thought, "how will she bear this sad disappointment when she hoped so much from my escape!"
Weak and trembling she rose from the bed, and taking the lamp in her hand staggeringly descended the stairs in quest of her poor companion in captivity and sorrow.
Fanny lay extended on the cot, moaning piteously. She cried out in surprise and terror, fearing that Haidee had returned to threaten and abuse her. But she soon saw that it was the sweet face of the captive girl that beamed upon her.
"My God, Miss Lawrence, is it you?" she said. "I thought, I hoped that you had escaped!"
Lily threw herself down upon the hard stone floor and wept piteously. The trial was hard upon herself, as affecting her own individual welfare.
Now the burden of this poor creature's sorrow added to the weight of her own made it almost insupportable. It was some time before she could summon sufficient calmness to relate her mournful story to the suffering creature.
"It is all over," she said in conclusion. "There is no hope of escape from our prison, and death is before us."
Fanny lay still, moaning now and then in pain. She made no attempt to rise, and at last Lily noticed the fact.
"What is the matter with you, my poor soul?" said she. "Are you worse? Are you unable to rise?"
"I cannot raise my head," answered the poor girl patiently, "my poor bones have been shaken and beaten terribly by old Haidee. I am very stiff and sore."
As well as she could she related the story of old Haidee's rage at her captive's escape, her descent into the dungeon and her wild onslaught on her starving captive. Lily wept at the recital of Fanny's sufferings.
"She was wreaking her rage at my escape, upon you, poor Fanny," said she. "Oh! God, why dost thou allow the wicked thus to triumph over the weak and the innocent?"
"Are you much hurt? Do you think you can survive it?" she asked presently in anxious tones.
"I don't know. I am very sore at present. There seems very little life left in me. Perhaps it would be better if I should die," said the poor creature despondently. The little spark of hope awakened in her breast by Lily's escape was dead now, and despair had claimed her for its own. Lily knelt by the cot and felt her hands. They were cold and clammy, and chilly dews stood upon the wasted brow. Lily started. Could this be death that was stealing over the poor captive? She feared it was, but she was afraid to linger longer lest old Haidee should find her out. She rose reluctantly.
"I wish I could stay with you, Fanny," said she. "It seems hard to leave you suffering thus alone. But if old Haidee should find me, she might kill you for fear I should betray her. So it seems that I must go. Good-night."
Lily took the poor, wasted hand and pressing it gently, went away, fearing that the few sands of life remaining to Harold Colville's injured wife were fast running out.
CHAPTER XVII
About a month subsequent to the events which have been related in the last chapter, Mrs. Vance and Ada Lawrence sat alone in the drawing-room of their splendid home. Ada had been reading, but the volume seemed to have little interest, for it had fallen from her hands to the floor, and she was reclining on a luxurious divan, looking bored and sad, while now and then a low sigh rippled across her coral lips.
She was very lovely, being a pure blonde with red and white complexion and hair of golden tint. Her face looked flower-like in its delicacy, gleaming out from the somber folds of her mourning dress.
Mrs. Vance, sitting opposite, absorbed in a voluminous billow of crimson crochet work, looked over at her, and started as if she had only just begun to realize the girl's exceeding fairness.
"How pretty she is," she thought apprehensively, "and how startling her likeness to her dead sister! Good Heavens! what if Lance should see the resemblance as plainly as I do, and fall in love with her for Lily's sake."
The thought which now presented itself for the first time was startling in its probability. She began to think that it was time for Ada to be going back to school. It was dangerous to keep that fair flower-face in Lancelot Darling's vicinity.
"Ada," said she, abruptly, "how old are you?"
"Sixteen," answered the girl sleepily, without lifting her drooping, golden-brown lashes.
"Almost old enough to come out in society," said the lady. "You will have to hurry and finish your education—you mean to graduate, of course. When are you going back to school?"
"I do not expect to go back at all," was the startling reply.
"Not go back," said Mrs. Vance, affecting extreme astonishment.
"Papa is so lonely now that Lily is gone," said Ada, choking back a sob, "that I have not the heart to leave him. I will stay with him and comfort him."
"But, my dear—you so young, so unformed in your manners—surely you will not sacrifice yourself thus! Let me advise you to go back to college another year at least," urged Mrs. Vance.
A little annoyed at her persistence, Ada sat up and looked across at her.
"Mrs. Vance," said she, coldly, "do you happen to know that if I took your advice and returned to my boarding-school this house could no longer be a home for you?"
"Why not?" asked the lady, a little fluttered.
"Do you not see?" said Ada, pointedly. "You are not related to papa at all. You are a young and handsome woman. If you and he were living here alone together, with no one but the servants, people would couple your names unpleasantly. So you comprehend that it is better for me to stay and play propriety."
"Ada, I do not believe you care whether I have a shelter over my head or not," said the widow, stung into anger by the pointed speech of the girl.
"I should be sorry to see any one houseless," answered Ada, calmly; "but to own the truth, Mrs. Vance, I must say that I am sorry that the same roof has to shelter us both. I do not like you, and I am honest enough to tell you so!"
"Because I am poor and you are rich," said Mrs. Vance, affecting to weep.
"It is not that," said the young girl. "It is not that you are no relation to papa, except by marriage, and that you forced yourself here and claimed a support when you might have earned one for yourself, as many another widow has done. No, it is not for these things, Mrs. Vance, for I might still like you in spite of them, though I might pity your lack of true independence. But I dislike you because I believe you are a false, deceitful, unprincipled woman, scheming for some secret end of your own."
"What have I ever done to you, Ada, that you should denounce me thus?" sobbed the widow.
"Nothing—you would not dare to, for my papa would turn you out of the house if you did," replied the girl, spiritedly. "But do you think, Mrs. Vance, I cannot see your present drift? Do you think I do not see how shamelessly you are courting Lance Darling, and trying to win him from poor Lily who has been dead these four months scarcely?"
"Perhaps