A murmur, so very faint as to be almost no sound at all, came like a
response from the girl's lips, and she all but imperceptibly stirred.
Her father neither heard nor saw, but Lanfear started forward. He made a
sudden clutch at the girl's wrist with the hand that had not left it and
then remained motionless. "She will never remember now--here."

He fell on his knees beside the bed and began to sob. "Oh, my dearest!
My poor girl! My love!" still keeping her wrist in his hand, and laying
his head tenderly on her arm. Suddenly he started, with a shout: "The
pulse!" and fell forward, crushing his ear against her heart, and
listened with bursts of: "It's beating! She isn't dead! She's alive!"
Then he lifted her in his arms, and it was in his embrace that she
opened her eyes, and while she clung to him, entreated:

"My father! Where is he?"

A dread fell upon both the men, blighting the joy with which they
welcomed her back to life. She took her father's head between her hands,
and kissed his bruised face. "I thought you were dead; and I thought
that mamma--" She stopped, and they waited breathless. "But that was
long ago, wasn't it?"

"Yes," her father eagerly assented. "Very long ago."

"I remember," she sighed. "I thought that I was killed, too. Was it
_all_ a dream?" Her father and Lanfear looked at each other. Which
should speak? "This is Doctor Lanfear, isn't it?" she asked, with a dim
smile. "And I'm not dreaming now, am I?" He had released her from his
arms, but she held his hand fast. "I know it is you, and papa; and yes,
I remember everything. That terrible pain of forgetting is gone! It's