“‘As we forgive’——” Conrad broke off suddenly; a strange look of gladness, of relief, of comprehension, flashing over the face that had been so full of terror and anguish. “‘As we forgive’—and you have forgiven—then it may be that He will forgive too. I could not believe it before—now I can—God be merciful to me, a sinner!” Those were his last words. Already his eyes were glazing. The hush as of the shadow of death was filling that dim room. Monica knelt beside the bed, a sense of deep awe upon her, praying with all the strength of her pure soul for the guilty, erring man—her husband’s murderer—dying beneath his roof. And as she thus knelt and prayed, a sudden sense of her husband’s presence filled all her soul with an inexpressible, indescribable thrill of mingled rapture and awe. She trembled, and her heart beat thick and fast; whether she were in the spirit or out of the spirit she did not know. And then—in deep immeasurable distance, far, far away, and yet distinctly, sweetly clear—unmistakable—the sound of a voice—Randolph’s voice—thrilling through infinity of space: “Monica! Monica! My wife!” She started to her feet, quivering in every limb. Conrad’s eyes were fixed upon her with an inexplicable look of joy. Had he heard it too? What did it mean—that strange cry from the spirit world in this hour of death and dawn? She leant over the dying man. “Conrad,” she said, in a voice that was full of an emotion too deep for any but the simplest of words, “I forgive you—so does Randolph; and I think God has forgiven you too.” The clear radiance of another day was shining upon the earth as the troubled, erring spirit was set free, and passed away into the great hereafter, whose secrets shall be read in God’s good time, when all but His Word shall have passed away. Let us not judge him—for is there not joy with the angels in heaven over one sinner that repenteth? Yes, all was over now: all the weary warfare of sin and strife; and with a calm majesty in death, that the beautiful face had never worn in life, Conrad Fitzgerald lay dead in Castle Trevlyn. [Illustration] CHAPTER THE THIRTIETH. LORD HADDON. “And you forgave him, Monica, you forgave him? The man who had killed your husband?” It was Beatrice who spoke, and she spoke with a sort of horror in her tone. Tom stood a little apart in the recess of the window, a heavy cloud upon his brow. Lord Haddon was leaning with averted face upon the high carved mantel-shelf. They had all come over early to Trevlyn to hear the fate of the hapless man who had died in the night. Beatrice felt an unquenchable longing to know if he had spoken before he died—if by chance the terrible secret had escaped in delirium from his lips; and she had insisted on coming with her husband. Her brother, who had arrived unexpectedly the previous evening, had made one of the party. He was hungering for another sight of Monica, and Trevlyn seemed to draw him like a magnet.