Page:The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (emended first edition), Volume 3.djvu/260

250 the changes of his features and listening to his failing breath. He had been silent a long time, and I thought he would never speak again, when he murmured, faintly but distinctly—

"Pray for me, Helen!"

"I do pray for you—every hour and every minute, Arthur; but you must pray for yourself."

His lips moved but emitted no sound;—then his looks became unsettled; and, from the incoherent half-uttered words that escaped him from time to time, supposing him to be now unconscious, I gently disengaged my hand from his, intending to steal away for a breath of air, for I was almost ready to faint; but a convulsive movement of the fingers, and a faintly whispered "Don't leave me!" immediately recalled me: I took his hand again, and held it till he was no more—and then I fainted; it was not grief; it was exhaustion that, till then, I had been enabled successfully to combat. Oh Frederick! none can imagine the