“Annie, Annie, let me in; I am dying!” She flew to the door, unlocked and opened it; and Harry, his coat wet with half-melted snow and covered with blood, staggered forward into her arms. CHAPTER XIX. “Let me stay here! Don’t send me away!” were Harry’s first words, as his wife led him to a chair and supported his head against her breast. “Yes, yes, you shall stay. Oh, Harry, what have you done? You are drenched to the skin and cold as ice! Where are you hurt? Is it only here?” She touched his forehead, from a cut in which the blood was still flowing. “That is all--I think,” said he, drowsily. “But I’m--cold.” He was shivering violently. She rang the bell for assistance; but it was too late to avert the consequences of that night’s work, and before morning the fever was back upon him. It was impossible to learn from him how it had happened. When his mind wandered, he talked disconnectedly of herself, sometimes tenderly, sometimes angrily and jealously, but always of her. Annie sat up by him all night, and in the morning, with softened tread and pale, downcast, anxious face, Lilian crept in. He did not know her--he did not know any one. “Go and get some rest now, Annie; I will watch by him,” she whispered. “Why, Lilian, you look as if you had sat up all night, too! What is the matter with you?” Lilian did not answer for a minute, but stood watching the restless movements of her sick brother; and, when she turned again to Annie, her proud gray eyes were full of tears. “I may as well tell you now, for you are sure to learn it as soon as poor Harry comes back to his senses--if he ever does.” She paused, and the other listened curiously for her confession, for a confession she felt sure it was that she had to hear. She was right; for Lilian went on: “Annie, you must not despise the poor fellow any more. He can act like a man if he can’t speak like a professor. If it had not been for him, I should have run away last night with--Colonel Richardson.” “Oh, Lilian!” “Don’t interrupt me,” went on the other hurriedly--“I may not feel inclined for confession again. I was to meet him--Colonel Richardson--at the lower gate. Well, Harry was there.” “But how was that?” “He thought it was you who were going off.” “I!” “Yes, yes, he did. I know whose doing that was. Stephen had guessed or found out something, and not having the pluck to stop me himself, and not wanting a general row, he got Harry to suppose it was you who were going off with----” “But Harry would never have believed that I----”