it--lost, lost for ever! I struggled frantically to rise and fly to her
assistance, and rose, after many efforts, to my knees, only to fall
again to the earth, insensible.






Chapter 16

The violent fever into which I had fallen did not abate until the third
day, when I fell into a profound slumber, from which I woke refreshed
and saved. I did not, on awakening, find myself in my own familiar cell,
but in a spacious apartment new to me, on a comfortable bed, beside
which Edra was seated. Almost my first feeling was one of disappointment
at not seeing Yoletta there, and presently I began to fear that in the
ravings of delirium I had spoken things which had plucked the scales
from the eyes of my kind friends in a very rough way indeed, and that
the being I loved best had been permanently withdrawn from my sight. It
was a blessed relief when Edra, in answer to the questions I put with
some heart-quakings to her, informed me that I had talked a great deal
in my fever, but unintelligibly, continually asking questions about
Venus, Diana, Juno, and many other persons whose names had never before
been heard in the house. How fortunate that my crazy brain had thus
continued vexing itself with this idle question! She also told me that
Yoletta had watched day and night at my side, that at last, when the
fever left me, and I had fallen into that cooling slumber, she too, with
her hand on mine, had dropped her head on the pillow and fallen asleep.
Then, without waking her, they had carried her away to her own room, and