“Jenny is dead, and I am dying,”—­a sad, a tragic message, surely!  And yet, as from the first shock and consequent turmoil of that message, its real significance slowly evolved, even Isabel was perhaps surprised to find it rather a happy than an unhappy significance.  Jenny was dead, and Theophil was dying; and yet, when at last she shook herself out of her reverie, her face was curiously lit with peace.

She presently discovered that there was a train north in two hours; and then she turned to her desk, and with that business-like carefulness with which we often act in a dream, she went over its contents, and methodically transferred its various accumulations to the tiny grate, which was soon blazing with unwonted summer fire.  A little handful of letters she saved, and from the diminutive locked cupboard in the centre she took out a small sealed packet, which was to be included among her luggage.

All trains do not separate.  There are also glad trains which bring together; and soon Isabel was in one of these, and soon it had taken her to Theophil,—­to whose ears at last had come the sound of wonderful wheels in the dead street, wheels that had stopped beneath his window, a rustle of alighting, an opening and shutting of doors, an approaching whisper on the staircase, and then, with reality unutterable—­Isabel.

Isabel!

You could hardly have told that Theophil was dying, and the face that Isabel thus found again was marked by none of the dreadful writing of death.  His eyes were brighter, his brow more hollow, his cheeks thinner,—­that was all; and he was to be of those of whom we have spoken, whose flame of life burns brightly to the end.  No heavy mists of Lethe hung about his bed.  Till his last heartbeat, he was to be conscious of the nearness of Isabel.  For a fortnight he was thus to lie within sight and touch of her.  How good life is!  Think of it, a whole fortnight!  How extravagantly blessed!

Isabel was living in the same house with him day after day.  She was no visitor, but went in and out of the room with the step of one who is at home.  If he grew weary and dozed a moment, she would still be sitting there when he awoke.  She was wearing home things.  One morning when she had been busied in the kitchen preparing some little delicacy for him, she had left her task for a moment to see if he needed anything; and as she had bent over him, she had worn a household apron,—­a wife’s apron.  Yes, she was at home, she would never leave him again, never leave him—­till he died.

“Oh, Isabel—­to die!” he moaned one night as she sat by his side.

“But think, dear,” she answered, with her head turned away, “think of Jenny.”

“Perhaps there is no Jenny.”

No Jenny!  Isabel’s heart gave a little cry.  No Jenny!  Then there could be no harm ...

“Theophil,” she said, after a silence, “have you forgotten something we said to each other that day,—­something we promised?”