For two long hours she had been alone with her dismal thoughts, no sound broke the stillness, save the monotonous ticking of the clock or an occasional sob and moan from the half spent wind without.
There was too much anxiety and agony in her mind for any of the nervous terrors which had haunted her during the day. Then, as she thought what the coming of the night would bring her, the heart in her bosom shuddered. Now it stood still and seemed hardening into iron. If some spirit had appeared with an articulate warning, she could not have been more convinced that exposure and ruin were approaching her with rapid strides. She would do her best, but that, she knew in her innermost soul, would lead to destruction. She looked back on the past weeks, and tried to remember if her plans had failed through her own weakness.
Before Mellen's return it had seemed possible to carry them out, to bury the past utterly, and build a new palace of hope on its grave, but they had all failed. It was not her fault, she had borne up as bravely as any woman could have done under the circumstances, had been as circumspect and guarded as it was possible to be, but from the moment of his inopportune arrival, some untoward event had occurred to thwart every project she had endeavered to carry out for her own salvation.
"It is fate," she muttered, in a cold whisper; "it is fate! Oh, my God, help me, help me, for I have yet a right to pray!"
No, even the consolations of prayer were denied this most wretched woman; the words seemed to freeze upon her lips; she could only moan in that broken whisper:
"My God, help me, help me!"
As she sat there, the door opened and Elsie softly entered the apartment. She had taken off her evening-dress, and put on a loose white wrapper, and over that had thrown a crimson shawl, which made the pallor that had come over her face still more apparent.
There was no light in the chamber except that given by the fire.
Elizabeth had extinguished the lamps; the gloom and the shadows befitted her mournful thoughts.
"Bessie, Bessie?" called Elsie, unable at first to distinguish any object in the half light. "Are you there?"