“We Could hardly believe that it was in us, any of us, to throw ourselves away,” Brandon answered, “if we were always warned to the point of prevention.”

Valentine sighed.  “I suppose we cannot have it both ways.  If God, because man is such a sinner, so overruled and overawed him that no crime could be committed, he would be half-unconscious of the sin in his nature, and would look up no more either for renewal or forgiveness.  Men obliged to abstain from evil could not feel that their nature was lower than their conduct.  When I have wished, Giles, as I often have done lately, that I could have my time over again, I have felt consoled, in knowing this could not be, to recollect how on the consciousness of the fault is founded the conscious longing for pardon.  But I will tell you more of all this to-morrow,” he added; and soon after that he fell asleep.

A nurse was to have watched with him that night, but Brandon could not sleep, and he desired that she should rest in an adjacent room till he called her.  In the meantime, never more hopeful since he had first seen Valentine on reaching Melcombe, he continued to sit by his bed, frequently repeating that he would go up-stairs shortly, but not able to do it.

At one o’clock Valentine woke, and Brandon, half excusing himself for being still there, said he could not sleep, and liked better to wake in that room than anywhere else.

Valentine was very wakeful now, and restless; he took some nourishment, and then wanted to talk.  All sorts of reminiscences of his childhood and early youth seemed to be present with him.  He could not be still, and at length Brandon proposed to read to him, and brought the lamp near, hoping to read him to sleep.

There was but one book to be read to a sick man in the dead of the night, when all the world was asleep, and great gulfs of darkness lurked in the corners of the room.

Giles read, and felt that Valentine was gradually growing calmer.  He almost thought he might be asleep, when he said—­“St. George, there’s no air in this room.”

“You must not have the windows open,” answered Brandon.

“Read me those last words again, then,” said Valentine, “and let me look out; it’s so dark here.”

Brandon read, “The fulness of Him that filleth all in all.”

Valentine asked to have the curtain drawn back, and for more than an hour continued gazing out at the great full moon now rapidly southing, and at the lofty pear-trees, so ghostly white, showering down their blossom in the night.  Brandon also sat looking now at the scene, now at him, till the welcome rest of another sleep came to him; and the moon went down, leaving their shaded lamp to lighten the space near it, and gleam on the gilding of quaint old cabinets and mirrors, and frames containing portraits of dead Melcombes, not one of whom either of these brothers had ever seen.

Brandon sat deep in thought, and glad to hear Valentine breathing so quietly, when the first solemn approaches of dawn appeared in the east; and as he turned to notice the change, Valentine woke, and gazed out also among the ghostly trees.