His voice dropped into a moan, and then again there was a long silence. At last Helen whispered, in a weak, trembling voice, “David, you have still love; can that be nothing to you?” “I have no right to love,” he groaned, “no right to love, and I never had any. For oh, all my life this vision has haunted me--I knew that nothing but death could have saved her from shame! Yes, and I knew, too, that some day I must find her. I have carried the terror of that in my heart all these years. Yet I dared to take your love, and dared to fly from my sin; and then there comes this thunderbolt--oh, merciful heaven, it is too much to bear, too much to bear!” He sank down again; poor Helen could find no word of comfort, no utterance of her own bursting heart except the same frantic clasp of her love. So the day went by over that shattered life; and each hour the man's despair grew more black, his grief and misery more hopeless. The girl watched him and followed him about as if she had been a child, but she could get him to take no food, and to divert his mind to anything else she dared not even try. He would sit for hours writhing in his torment, and then again he would spring up and pace the room in agitation, though he was too weak to bear that very long. Afterwards the long night came on, and all through it he lay tossing and moaning, sometimes shuddering in a kind of paroxysm of grief,--Helen, though she was weary and almost fainting, watching thro the whole night, her heart wild with her dread. And so the morning came, and another day of misery; and in the midst of it David flung himself down upon the sofa and buried his face in his arms and cried out, “Oh God, my God, I cannot stand it, I cannot stand it! Oh, let me die! I dare not lift my head--there is no hope for me--there is no life for me--I dare not pray! It is more than I can bear--I am beaten, I am lost forever!” And Helen fell down upon her knees beside him, and tore away his hands from his face and stared at him frantically, exclaiming, “David, it is too cruel! Oh, have mercy upon me, David, if you love me!” He stopped and gazed long and earnestly into her face, and a look of infinite pity came into his eyes; at last he whispered, in a low voice, “Poor, poor little Helen; oh, Helen, God help you, what can I do?” He paused and afterwards went on tremblingly, “What have you done that you should suffer like this? You are right that it is too cruel--it is another curse that I have to bear! For I knew that I was born to suffering--I knew that my life was broken and dying--and yet I dared to take yours into it! And now, what can I do to save you, Helen; can you not see that I dare not live?”