“The family are all gathered around the grand piano, listening to Madame Pezzilini playing and singing—Heaven help them! and the servants are all at dinner in the servants’ hall.”
“That is well! It is the very hour for me to steal out of the house unobserved. Lock the door and come with me, Tabitha.”
They left the room, glided down the back stairs, and out at the back door.
Annella flew across the lawn; through the park, out upon the downs, and into the high road. She ran along a little way, and then struck into a by-path leading through a narrow, wooded valley, or “coombe,” lying between two rolling uplands of the downs, and leading towards Abbeytown. As soon as she found herself out of the reach of discovery and pursuit, and safely hidden in this thicket, she sat down to recover her breath and to still the violent throbbing of her heart.
Surely if Tabitha Tabs had noticed the signs of excitement and almost of insanity in the expression of Annella’s face, she had not consented to her leaving the house. But the darkness of the bed-chamber and of the narrow back staircase had obscured the woman’s vision, and the assumed calmness and self-restrained manner of Annella had disarmed her caution.
But any rambler passing that way, and seeing Annella as she sat, with glowing cheeks and sparkling eyes, and restless, frenzied manner, would have felt justified in taking her in charge upon his own responsibility, and delivering her up to her friends as a wandering maniac.
But withal Annella had as yet a strange, self-regulating power that enabled her to control these frequently-recurring fits of excitement.
She sat quietly in the cool shadows of the wood until its spirit had entered into her soul, and for the time, at least, calmed its fever.
Then she arose and took her way towards the prison.
With the order in her pocket, she was at once admitted.