For fifteen days and nights Churchill Penwyn watched beside his wife’s bed with only such brief intervals of rest as exhausted nature demanded; an occasional hour, when he allowed himself to fall into a troubled slumber, on the sofa at the foot of the bed, from which he would start into sudden wakefulness, unrefreshed, but with no power to sleep longer. Even in sleep he did not lose consciousness. One awful idea for ever pursued him, the expectation of an inevitable end. She, for whom he could have been content to sacrifice all that earth can give of fame or fortune, she with whom it would have been sweet to him to begin a life of care and toil, his idolized wife, was to be taken from him. London physicians had been summoned, two of the greatest. There had been solemn consultations in Madge’s pretty dressing-room, the room where she had been so utterly happy in the first bright years of her wedded life; and after each counsel of medical authorities, Churchill had gone in to hear their verdict, gravely, vaguely delivered,—a verdict which left him at sea, tempest-tossed by alternate waves of hope and fear. There had come one awful morning, after a fortnight’s uncertainty, when the great London physician and Dr. Hillyard received him in absolute silence. The little grey-haired Seacomb doctor turned away his face, and shuffled over to the window; the London physician grasped Churchill’s hand without a word. ‘I understand you,’ said Churchill. ‘All is over.’ His calm tone surprised the two medical men; but the man of wider experience was not deceived by it. He had seen that quiet manner, heard that passionless tone too often before. ‘All has been done that could be done,’ he said kindly. ‘It may be a comfort for you to remember that in days to come, however little it lessens your loss now.’ ‘Comfort!’ echoed Churchill, drearily. ‘There is no comfort for me without her. I thank you for having done your uttermost, gentlemen. I will go back to her.’ He left them without another word, and returned to the darkened room where Madge Penwyn’s brief life was drifting fast to its untimely close, under the despairing eyes of her sister Viola, who from first to last had shared Churchill’s watch. But seldom had either of these two won a recognising glance from those clouded eyes,—a word of greeting from those parched lips. Only in delirium had Madge called her husband by his name, but in all her wanderings his name was ever on her lips, her broken thoughts were of him. At the last, some hours after the doctors had spoken their final sentence and departed, those tender eyes were raised to Churchill’s face, with one long, penetrating look, love ineffable in death. The wasted arms were feebly raised. He understood the unexpressed desire, and drew them gently round his neck. The lovely head sank upon his breast, the lips parted in a happy smile, and with a faint sigh of contentment, bade farewell to earthly care.