The Scotchman sitting at the writing-table, the doctor stirring
a stimulant mixture in a corner, looked at each other with an
anxiety in both their faces which they could neither of them
control. The words that banished the wife from the room were
spoken. The moment had come.

"You can go now," said Mr. Armadale, for the second time.

She looked at the child, established comfortably on the bed, and
an ashy paleness spread slowly over her face. She looked at the
fatal letter which was a sealed secret to her, and a torture of
jealous suspicion--suspicion of that other woman who had been the
shadow and the poison of her life--wrung her to the heart. After
moving a few steps from the bedside, she stopped, and came back
again. Armed with the double courage of her love and her despair,
she pressed her lips on her dying husband's cheek, and pleaded
with him for the last time. Her burning tears dropped on his face
as she whispered to him: "Oh, Allan, think how I have loved you!
think how hard I have tried to make you happy! think how soon
I shall lose you! Oh, my own love! don't, don't send me away!"

The words pleaded for her; the kiss pleaded for her; the
recollection of the love that had been given to him, and never
returned, touched the heart of the fast-sinking man as nothing
had touched it since the day of his marriage. A heavy sigh broke
from him. He looked at her, and hesitated.

"Let me stay," she whispered, pressing her face closer to his.

"It will only distress you," he whispered back.