She was perfectly steady as she followed his instructions, and even though in the process her hands were stained with Guy’s blood, she did not shrink again.  It was no easy task, but Burke’s skill and strength of muscle accomplished it at last.  Across Guy’s body he looked at her with a certain grim triumph.

“Well played, partner!  That’s the first move.  Are you all right?”

She saw by his eyes that her face betrayed the horror at her heart.  She tried to smile at him, but her lips felt stiff and cold.  Her look went back to the ashen face on the floor.

“What—­what must be done next?” she said.

“He will have to stay as he is till we can get a doctor,” Burke answered.  “The bleeding has stopped for the present, but—­” He broke off.

“Child, how sick you look!” he said.  “Here, come and wash!  There’s nothing more to be done now.”

She got up, feeling her knees bend beneath her but controlling them with rigid effort.  “I—­am all right,” she said.  “You—­you think he isn’t dead?”

Burke’s hand closed upon her elbow.  “He’s not dead,—­no!  He may die of course, but I don’t fancy he will at present,—­not while he lies like that.”

He was drawing her out of the room, but she resisted him suddenly.  “I can’t go.  I can’t leave him—­while he lives.  Burke, don’t, please, bother about me!  Are you—­are you going to fetch a doctor?”

“Yes,” said Burke.

She looked at him, her eyes wide and piteous.  “Then please go now—­go quickly!  I—­will stay with him till you come back.”

“I shall have to leave you for some hours,” he said.

“Oh, never mind that!” she answered, “Just be as quick as you can, that’s all!  I will be with him.  I—­shan’t be afraid.”

She was urging him to the door, but he turned back.  He went to the table, picked up the revolver he had laid there, and put it away in a cupboard which he locked.

She marked the action, and as he came to her again, laid a trembling hand upon his arm.  “Burke!  Could it—­could it have been an accident?”

“No.  It couldn’t,” said Burke.  He paused a moment, looking at her in a way she did not understand.  She wondered afterwards what had been passing in his mind.  But he said no further word except a brief, “Good-bye!”

Ten minutes later, she heard the quick thud of his horse’s hoofs as he rode into the night.

CHAPTER IX

THE ABYSS

“Sylvia!”

Was it a voice that spoke in the overwhelming silence, or was it the echo in her soul of a voice that would never speak again?  Sylvia could not decide.  She had sat for so long, propped against a chair, watching that still figure on the floor, straining her senses to see or hear some sign of breathing, trying to cheat herself into the belief that he slept, and then with a wrung heart wondering if he were not better dead.