Tears gushed from my eyes and checked my utterance. Oh! how sad, how dreadful, to address a father thus.
"Gabriella!" he exclaimed, "you are an angel. Pray for me, pray for me, thou pure and holy being, and forgive the sins that you say are not beyond the reach of God's mercy, I dare not, not here,—yet for one dear embrace, my child, I would willingly meet the tortures of the prison-house and the scaffold."
I recoiled with horror at the suggestion. I would not have had his arms around me for worlds. I could not call him father. I pitied,—wept for him; but I shrunk with loathing from his presence. Dropping my veil over my face, I turned hastily, gained the street, pressed on through the moving mass without looking to the right or left, till I reached the shop where my jewels were deposited,—took them without waiting for explanation or inquiry, hurried back till I met St. James, slipped the casket into his eager hand, and pressed on without uttering a syllable. Never shall I forget the expression of his countenance as he received the casket. The fierce, wild, exulting flash of his dark sunken eye, whose reddish blackness seemed suddenly to ignite and burn like heated iron. There was something demoniac in its glare, and it haunted me in my dreams long, long afterwards.
I did not look back, but hurried on, rejoicing that rapidity of motion was too customary in Broadway to attract attention. Before I arrived at the place of meeting, I wished to divest myself of the shawl which I had used as a disguise; and it was no difficult matter, where poverty is met in all its forms of wretchedness and woe.
"Take this, my good woman," said I, throwing the soft gray covering over the shoulders of a thin, shivering, haggard looking female, on whose face chill penury was written in withering lines. "You are cold and suffering."
"Bless your sweet face. God Almighty bless you!" was wafted to my ears, in tremulous accents,—for I did not stop to meet her look of wonder, gratitude, and ecstasy. I did not deserve her blessing; but the garment sheltered her meagre frame, and she went on her way rejoicing.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
When I entered Mrs. Brahan's drawing-room, I was in a kind of somnambulism,—moving, walking, seeing, yet hardly conscious of what I was doing, or what was passing around me. She was the president of the association, and a very charming woman.
"We feared we were not going to see you this morning," she said, glancing at a French clock, which showed the lateness of the hour; "but we esteem it a privilege to have you with us, even for a short time. We know," she added, with a smile, "what a sacrifice we impose on Mr. Linwood, when we deprive him of your society."