Lovel broke off, and passed his hands before his eyes to drive away the fearful images which his description had aroused. Barbara had fallen back upon her seat, hiding her face in her hands, shivering with horror and pain.
"Terrible! terrible! God pardon them!" she gasped, "for they know not what they do!"
"I tell you he will curse them for it—oh yes, I do believe there is an eternity of suffering, and it is men like those who must endure it. There stood the ministers and the judges in solemn array looking on—the selectmen of the church and town—and enormities like these they call religion—"
"No more, say no more!" pleaded Barbara. "I feel it all—I cannot breathe—I seem to have the hangman's cord on my throat—his rough grasp on my arm—do not speak of it again."
She was writhing with strange anguish—it seemed to her as if his words had been a premonition of doom!
"I must go and walk in the garden," she said, arising; "this has driven me wild."
She passed down the steps, and the young man turned to follow; but at that moment, through the oaken door, came an imperious summons, twice repeated—
"Norman Lovel! Norman Lovel!"
It was the governor's voice, in a tone of command that he never used unless greatly excited. Norman uttered an apology, which Barbara did not heed, and rushed into the hall.