The terrified wife knelt down by the bed in the deep gloom, and in the still deeper gloom behind, the son buried his face in his arms, and leaned upon the little table.
Whilst Rowland Prothero was praying from the very depth of his heart for the soul that was thus awfully passing to its account, they were all aroused by the last fearful struggle between death and life of him who had made gold his god.

For some time they feared to rekindle the light, but at last they ventured.

It was but to witness the last dread pangs of one who had made wife and son secondary to the great absorbing passion of avarice; and now he was constrained to depart from the scene of his toil, and to leave all that he had grovelled for behind him, for ever! We will not dwell upon the awful hours that succeeded his final words.
He neither spoke nor was conscious again.

Light and dark were alike to him.

Save that he grasped something in his right hand with an iron hold, reason and power had left him; death was still fighting with life, and gradually gaining the last great victory.
A few hours afterwards, and when that victory had been gained, the scene was changed in that small house.