One would have thought she slept, had it not been for the rigidity of her stiffened limbs, and the wax-like pallor of her face and hands.

Right across her form, almost covering it from view, a man lay prone, as though he had fallen there lifeless--indeed he might have been dead also for any sign he showed to the contrary.

His arms were closed firmly round the girl's corpse--his face was hidden from view on the cold breast that would no more respond to the warmth of his caresses.

A straight beam of sunlight shot like a golden spear into the dark little room and lighted up the whole scene--the prostrate figures on the bed--the erect form of the compassionate king, and the grave and anxious faces of the little crowd of people who stood around him.
"See! that is the way he has been ever since last night when she died," whispered the woman who had before spoken; "and his hands are clinched round her like iron--one cannot move a finger!" The king advanced.

He touched the shoulder of the unhappy lover.