"My dear Mrs. Gardiner--for such I presume you to be--your interference at this critical moment, attempting to thwart my judgment, would--ay, I say _would_--prove fatal to your husband. This is a moment when a physician must act upon his own responsibility, knowing that a human life depends upon his swiftness and his skill, I beg of you to leave all to me." "I say it shall not be!" cried Sally, flinging herself across her husband's prostrate body. "Touch him at your peril, Doctor Baker!" For an instant all in the apartment were almost dumbfounded. Miss Margaret was the first to recover herself. "Sally," she said, approaching her sister-in-law slowly, her blue eyes looking stealthily down into the glittering, frenzied green ones, "come with me. You want to save Jay's life, don't you? Put down that knife, and come with me. You are wasting precious moments that may mean life or death to the one we both love. Let me plead with you, on my knees, if need be, to come with me, dear." Sally Gardiner stood at bay like a lioness. Quick as a flash, she had thought out the situation. If Jay Gardiner died, she would be free to fly with Victor Lament. If she refused to allow the doctor to touch him, he would die, and never discover the loss of the diamonds, or that she had borrowed money from his friends on leaving Newport. If he died, she would be a wealthy woman for life, and she would never be obliged to look again into the face of the handsome husband whom she hated--the husband who hated her, and who did not take the pains to conceal it in his every act each day since he had married her. Ah! if he only died here and now it would save her from all the ills that menaced her and were closing in around her. This was her opportunity. Fate--fortune had put the means of saving herself in her hands. Even the good doctor was sorely perplexed. He saw that young Mrs. Gardiner was a desperate woman, and that she meant what she said. "Will nothing under Heaven cause you to relent?" cried Margaret, wringing her hands, her splendid courage breaking down completely under the great strain of her agony. "My poor mother lies in the next room in a death-like swoon, caused by the knowledge of her idolized son's fatal illness. If he should die, she would never see another morning's sun after she learned of it. One grave would cover both." CHAPTER LI. We must now return to Bernardine, dear reader. "Oh, I was mad--mad to remain a single instant beneath this roof when I discovered whose home it was!" she moaned, sinking down on the nearest hassock and rocking herself to and fro in an agony of despair. "I--I could have lived my life better if I had not looked upon his face again, or seen the bride who had won his love from me. I will go, I will leave this grand house at once. Let them feast and make merry. None of them knows that a human heart so near them is breaking slowly under its load of woe."