Instantaneously there is a quick, panther-like spring, and Claire Keith's little hand strikes the arm that directs the deadly weapon. There is a sharp report, but the direction of the bullet is changed. Madeline Payne stands erect and startled, while Edward Percy falls to the floor, the blood gushing from a wound in his breast. In another instant, Lucian Davlin lies prostrate, felled by a blow from one detective, while the other bends over him and savagely adjusts a pair of manacles. The others, even to Cora, group themselves about the wounded man. Dr. Vaughan kneels beside him a moment, then he lifts his eyes to meet those of Madeline. "It is a death wound," he says. "Prepare a couch in the next room directly. He must not be carried up-stairs." When this order has been obeyed, and the injured man has been removed, Madeline returns to the drawing-room, untenanted now save by the officers and their prisoner. They are waiting there until the midnight train shall be due, and the time approaches. Moving quite near to the now silent, sullen villain, the girl surveys him with absolute loathing. "The goddess you worship has deserted you, Lucian Davlin," she says, slowly. "It was not in the book of chance that you should triumph over or outwit me. The bullet you designed for me has completed the work you began five years ago. Go, to live a convict, or die on the scaffold, and when you think upon the failure of your villainous schemes, remember that this retribution has been wrought by a woman's hand! Officers, take him away!" Through the darkness they hurry him, from the sights and scenes of Oakley and Bellair--forever. His goddess has indeed forsaken him. When the two officers take leave of him at the prison, he has had his last glimpse of the outside world. [Illustration: "Edward Percy falls to the floor, the blood gushing from a wound in the breast!"--page 439.] From the moment when he failed in his attempt upon the life that had defied him, no word had escaped his lips. Silent, moody, and utterly hopeless, this proud-spirited, evil-hearted Son of Chance, enters the prison gates, and, as they close upon him, we have done with Lucian Davlin, a _convict for life_! CHAPTER XLIX. AS THE FOOL DIETH. Edward Percy is dying--was dying when they lifted him from the drawing-room carpet, and gently laid him on the couch hastily prepared by Hagar and the frightened servants. They have watched beside him through the night, and now, in the gray of the morning, Clarence Vaughan still keeps his vigil. The wounded man moves feebly, and turns his fast dimming eyes toward the watcher. "I thought--I saw--some one," he says, brokenly, "when--I fell. Who--was--the lady?" His voice dies away, as Clarence, bending over him, answers gently: "You mean the lady that stood near the door, whose face was turned away?" "Yes," in a whisper; "was it--my--wife?" Clarence turns toward the window where Mrs. Ralston sits, out of view of the sick man.