CHAPTER VIII.
THE STRANGE TUG'S VOYAGE.
"Dead, dead, my darling!" almost shrieked Randall Clayton as he cast himself down on his knees at the side of the woman whose faintly fluttering eyelids alone told of the vital spark of life.

The dark eyes of Madame Raffoni gleamed pityingly as she drew the young man, almost by force, away.
With an agony of sudden terror she pointed to the hallway, and laid her finger upon her lip.

And then, in a hoarse whisper, the woman told, in her patois, broken with sobs, of the alternate spells of fainting and exhaustion which had brought Irma Gluyas nigh to Death's door.
The darkened rooms were closed, and the air redolent of the pungent narcotic drugs of the sickroom.

Utterly unmanned, Randolph Clayton stole back to the old drawing-room, whose rich gilding and frescoed beauties mocked the pale, silent face lying there below.
Forgetting all prudence, he covered the limp, helpless hand with burning kisses, gazing into the drooping eyes where he would fain call back a glance of life and love.

In this supreme moment she belonged only to him, by right of his loyal love.