To attempt to loosen that bearlike clasp might be death to any who attempted it.
Reuben looked about him, still holding his sister in his arms as though to keep her away from the peril; and Dan, who had taken one step forward towards the sheeted spectre, paused and muttered between his teeth: "The hound! he has but got his deserts!" "True," said Reuben, for he was certain now that it had been Frederick who was Dorcas's pursuer; "yet we must not leave him thus.

He will be strangled or choked by the pestilential smell if we cannot get him away.

Take Dorcas, Dan.

Let me see if I can do aught with him." But even as Reuben spoke, and Dorcas clung closer than ever to him in fear that he was about to adventure himself into greater peril, the delirious man suddenly flung Frederick from him, so that he fell upon the pavement almost as one dead; and then, with a hideous shriek that rang in their ears for long, fled back to the house as rapidly as he had left it, and fell down dead a few moments later upon the bed from which he had so lately risen.
That fact they learned only the next day.

For the moment it was enough that the patient was safely within doors again, and that the watchman could make fast the door.