The lightning glances,
the gentle, rare voice, the wasted face; and by him will be Kate
Cumberland; and they both will seem to be listening, listening--for
what?
"No more to-night. But, Loughburne, you should be here; I feel that the
like of this has never been upon the earth.
"Byrne."
CHAPTER XIX
SUSPENSE
He found them as he had expected, the girl beside the couch, and the old
man prone upon it, wrapped to the chin in a gaudy Navajo blanket. But
to-night his eyes were closed, a most unusual thing, and Byrne could
look more closely at the aged face. For on occasions when the eyes were
wide, it was like looking into the throat of a searchlight to stare at
the features--all was blurred. He discovered now wrinkled and
purple-stained lids under the deep shadow of the brows--and eyes were so
sunken that there seemed to be no pupils there. Over the cheek bones the
skin was drawn so tightly that it shone, and the cheeks fell away into
cadaverous hollows. But the lips, beneath the shag of grey beard, were
tightly compressed. No, this was not sleep. It carried, as Byrne gazed,
a connotation of swifter, fiercer thinking, than if the gaunt old man
had stalked the floor and poured forth a tirade of words.
The girl came to meet the doctor. She said: "Will you use a narcotic?"
"Why?" asked Byrne. "He seems more quiet than usual."
"Look more closely," she whispered.
And when he obeyed, he saw that the whole body of Joe Cumberland
quivered like an aspen, continually.
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