"Not unless you wish to drive your husband from his own house. I will not be reminded, by any one connected with that night, that it was the mad passion of our love which drove that most unhappy woman from her home, her country, and, at last, into her grave!"
Rachael sat with her glittering eyes fastened on his face. She longed to ask a question; but it seemed to freeze upon her lips. But, at last, she spoke:
"Do you repent that love, then?"
"No! no! Would to God I had the power to repent! but I cannot, Rachael, with you by me!"
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE STORMY NIGHT AND SUNSHINY MORNING.
Lady Clara found her way into the house unnoticed, and stole back to her own room, weary and heart-sick from the excitement she had passed through.
For more than an hour she sat by her window looking out upon the moonlight which flooded the lawn, and the dense black shadows of the trees beyond.
The stillness gradually hushed her sobs into a sad calm, and, without other light than that which came from the moon, she crept into her bed, and lay there, as if buried in a snow-drift, cold and shivering from exhausting emotions and exposure to the night air.
She could not sleep, but lay thinking of the man who had been driven from the house that night, wondering where he was, and when, upon the earth, she would meet him.