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Rh have gold in abundance; but I entreat of your humanity to let us enter. Would you spend your own last hours in dreary solitude, uncheered by a single farewell to those the dearest to your heart? Would you die, if far away from them, without sending them one remembrance or one blessing?"

There was something in Francesca's look and manner that availed her even more than words: command seemed so much her right, that it was scarcely possible not to yield.

"Pass on," said the soldier, opening the door of the apartment, and gazing earnestly on the pale, beautiful, and foreign-looking face."

"Nay, my friend, no refusal—it is no bribe, for it won you not to grant my prayer: but I have now no other way of shewing my gratitude."

Drawing her veil closely around her, and taking Lucy's arm, though it was her own that gave the support, she entered the room, and closed the door; when, listening for a moment, she heard the monotonous and heavy tread of the soldier echoing through the passage.

"He sleeps," exclaimed Lucy, bending tenderly over Evelyn—loath, even in that extremity, to waken him.

"You must rouse him, dearest—every minute is precious."