I did not return immediately to my patient. I waited till her supper came up. Then I took the tray, and assured by the face of the girl who brought it that Miss Althorpe had explained my presence in her house sufficiently² for me to feel at my ease before her servants, I carried in the dainty repast she had provided and set it down on the table.  
The poor woman was standing³ where we had left her; but her whole figure showed languor⁴, and she more than leaned against the bedpost behind her. As I looked up from the tray and met her eyes, she shuddered⁵ and seemed to be endeavoring to understand who I was and what I was doing in her room. My premonitions in regard to her were well based. She was in a raging fever, and was already more than half oblivious⁶ to her surroundings.
 
Approaching her, I spoke⁷ as gently as I could, for her hapless condition appealed to me in spite of my well founded prejudices against her; and seeing she was growing incapable⁸ of response, I drew her up on the bed and began to undress her.
 
I half expected her to recoil⁹ at this, or at least to make some show of alarm, but she submitted to my ministrations almost gratefully, and neither shrank nor[Pg 245] questioned me till I laid my hands upon her shoes. Then indeed she quivered, and drew her feet away with such an appearance of terror that I was forced to desist from my efforts or drive her into violent delirium¹⁰.
 
This satisfied me that Louise Van Burnam lay before me. The scar concerning which so much had been said in the papers would be ever present in the thoughts of this woman as the tell-tale mark by which she might be known, and though at this moment she was on the borders of unconsciousness, the instinct of self-preservation still remained in sufficient force to prompt her to make this effort to protect herself from discovery.
 
I had told Miss Althorpe that my chief reason for intruding¹¹ upon Miss Oliver, was to determine if she had in her possession certain rings supposed to have been taken from a friend of mine; and while this was in a measure true—the rings being an important factor in the proof I was accumulating against her,—I was not so anxious to search for them at this time as to find the scar which would settle at once the question of her identity.
 
When she drew her foot away from me then, so violently, I saw that I needed to search no farther for the evidence required, and could give myself up to making her comfortable. So I bathed her temples, now throbbing¹² with heat, and soon had the satisfaction of seeing her fall into a deep and uneasy slumber¹³. Then I tried again to draw off her shoes, but the start she gave and the smothered¹⁴ cry which escaped her warned me that I must wait yet longer before satisfying my curiosity; so I desisted at once, and out of pure compassion¹⁵ left her to get what good she might from the lethargy into which she had fallen.[Pg 246]
 
Being hungry, or at least feeling the necessity of some slight aliment to help me sustain the fatigues¹⁶ of the night, I sat down now at the table and partook of some of the dainties with which Miss Althorpe had kindly¹⁷ provided me. After which I made out a list of such articles as were necessary to my proper care of the patient who had so strangely fallen into my hands, and then, feeling that I had a right at last to indulge in pure curiosity, I turned my attention to the clothing I had taken from the self-styled Miss Oliver.
 
The dress was a simple gray one, and the skirts and underclothing all white. But the latter was of the finest texture¹⁸, and convinced me, before I had given them more than a glance, that they were the property of Howard Van Burnam's wife. For, besides the exquisite¹⁹ quality of the material, there were to be seen, on the edges of the bands and sleeves, the marks of stitches and clinging threads of lace, where the trimming had been torn off, and in one article especially, there were tucks such as you see come from the hands of French needlewomen only.
 
This, taken with what had gone before, was proof enough to satisfy me that I was on the right track, and after Crescenze had come and gone with the tray and all was quiet in this remote part of the house, I ventured to open a closet door at the foot of the bed. A brown silk skirt was hanging within, and in the pocket of that skirt I found a purse so gay and costly²⁰ that all doubt vanished as to its being the property of Howard's luxurious²¹ wife.
 
There were several bills in this purse, amounting to about fifteen dollars in money, but no change and no memoranda²², which latter seemed a pity. Restoring[Pg 247] the purse to its place and the skirt to its peg²³, I came softly back to the bedside and examined my patient still more carefully than I had done before. She was asleep and breathing heavily, but even with this disadvantage her face had its own attraction, an attraction which evidently had more or less influenced men, and which, for the reason perhaps that I have something masculine in my nature, I discovered to be more or less influencing me, notwithstanding my hatred²⁴ of an intriguing²⁵ character.
 
However, it was not her beauty I came to study, but her hair, her complexion²⁶, and her hands. The former was brown, the brown of that same lock I remembered to have seen in the jury's hands at the inquest; and her skin, where fever had not flushed it, was white and smooth. So were her hands, and yet they were not a lady's hands. That I noticed when I first saw her. The marks of the rings she no longer wore, were not enough to blind me to the fact that her fingers lacked the distinctive²⁷ shape and nicety of Miss Althorpe's, say, or even of the Misses Van Burnam; and though I do not object to this, for I like strong-looking, capable hands myself, they served to help me understand the face, which otherwise would have looked too spiritual for a woman of the peevish²⁸ and self-satisfied character of Louise Van Burnam. On this innocent and appealing expression she had traded in her short and none too happy career. And as I noted²⁹ it, I recalled a sentence in Miss Ferguson's testimony³⁰, in which she alluded³¹ to Mrs. Van Burnam's confidential³² remark to her husband upon the power she exercised over people when she raised her eyes in entreaty³³ towards them. "Am I not pretty," she had said, "when I am in distress[Pg 248] and looking up in this way?" It was the suggestion of a scheming woman, but from what I had seen and was seeing of the woman before me, I could imagine the picture she would thus make, and I do not think she overrated its effects.
 
Withdrawing from her side once more, I made a tour of the room. Nothing escaped my eyes; nothing was too small to engage my attention. But while I failed to see anything calculated to shake my confidence in the conclusions I had come to, I saw but little to confirm them. This was not strange; for, apart from a few toilet articles and some knitting-work on a shelf, she appeared to have no belongings³⁴; everything else in sight being manifestly the property of Miss Althorpe. Even the bureau drawers were empty, and her bag, found under a small table, had not so much in it as a hair-pin, though I searched it inside and out for her rings, which I was positive she had with her, even if she dared not wear them.
 
When every spot was exhausted³⁵ I sat down and began to brood over what lay before this poor being, whose flight and the great efforts she made at concealment³⁶ proved only too conclusively³⁷ the fatal part she had played in the crime for which her husband had been arrested. I had reached her arraignment³⁸ before a magistrate³⁹, and was already imagining her face with the appeal in it which such an occasion would call forth⁴⁰, when there came a low knock at the door, and Miss Althorpe re-entered.
 
She had just said good-night to her lover, and her face recalled to me a time when my own cheek was round and my eye was bright and—Well! what is the use of dwelling⁴¹ on matters so long buried in oblivion![Pg 249] A maiden-woman, as independent as myself, need not envy any girl the doubtful blessing⁴² of a husband. I chose to be independent, and I am, and what more is there to be said about it? Pardon the digression.
 
"Is Miss Oliver any better?" asked Miss Althorpe; "and have you found——"
 
I put up my finger in warning. Of all things, it was most necessary that the sick woman should not know my real reason for being there.
 
"S............