Page:The Fate of Fenella (1892).djvu/290

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GEORGE MANVILLE FENN.
275

at him reproachfully, but with a yearning look of forgiveness in her eyes.

"Yes, there must be forgiveness now," he muttered feverishly; "I do not deserve it, but for Ronny's sake. And she is waiting for me—waiting till I go to her and on my knees beg her to come, and she will come, for the sake of our darling boy."

He was hurrying on with the busy tide of life eddying by his side, but his eyes had once more assumed their fixed, hypnotic look as he gazed straight before him, seeing the chamber in which his child lay dying, as it seemed, his little head tossing from side to side, while his monotonous, ceaseless cry was for his mother.

He had room but for one thought now, and that was to fetch Fenella to her boy's bedside; and as the mental vision faded, and his countenance resumed its wonted aspect, the influence remained.

He hesitated for a few moments, thinking that he would first return to the hotel, but feeling that if the boy were worse he would not have the strength of mind to leave him, he forced himself in the other direction and made straight for the great station.

"It was madness to expect her to come here," he kept on muttering. "It was my duty to fetch her to our child."

His actions were almost mechanical, but