"If you please, we
will have him conducted where the surgeon may see and report upon his
case without delay." To this there could be no objection; and Frances
felt a chill at her heart, as her lover withdrew, without casting a
solitary look on herself.
There is a devotedness in female love that admits of no rivalry. All the
tenderness of the heart, all the powers of the imagination, are enlisted
in behalf of the tyrant passion; and where all is given, much is looked
for in return. Frances had spent hours of anguish, of torture, on
account of Dunwoodie, and he now met her without a smile, and left her
without a greeting. The ardor of her feelings was unabated, but the
elasticity of her hopes was weakened. As the supporters of the nearly
lifeless body of Dunwoodie's friend passed her, in their way to the
apartment prepared for his reception, she caught a view of this
seeming rival.
His pale and ghastly countenance, sunken eye, and difficult breathing,
gave her a glimpse of death in its most fearful form. Dunwoodie was by
his side and held his hand, giving frequent and stern injunctions to the
men to proceed with care, and, in short, manifesting all the solicitude
that the most tender friendship could, on such an occasion, inspire.
Frances moved lightly before them, and, with an averted face, she held
open the door for their passage to the bed; it was only as the major
touched her garments, on entering the room, that she ventured to raise
her mild blue eyes to his face.
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