"Thank God!" he cried hoarsely. "You are alive."

Her mind as yet could only work in a single groove.

"Why did you do that?" she whispered.

"Do what?"

"Bite your nail off!"

"It was in my way. I wished to cut open your dress at the waist. You
were collapsed, almost dead, I thought, and I wanted to unfasten your
corsets."

Her color came back with remarkable rapidity. From all the rich variety
of the English tongue few words could have been selected of such
restorative effect.

She tried to assume a sitting posture, and instinctively her hands
traveled to her disarranged costume.

"How ridiculous!" she said, with a little note of annoyance in her
voice, which sounded curiously hollow. But her brave spirit could not
yet command her enfeebled frame. She was perforce compelled to sink
back to the support of his knee and arm.

"Do you think you could lie quiet until I try to find some water?" he
gasped anxiously.