Am I the wretch that bears this shame,
Deprived of freedom, friends and fame?”
The chamber in which Lady Leaton had died, and where Eudora was imprisoned, had, in the olden time, been the abbot’s apartment. It was a vast, dark, gloomy room, now dimly lighted by a lamp that stood upon the mantelshelf.
For a long time after Malcolm Montrose, Dr. Watkins and the constables had withdrawn from the chamber, Eudora remained, crushed back in the depths of the large chair, with her head bowed upon her bosom, her black ringlets falling forward, and half veiling her beautiful dark face, her left hand, that Malcolm had resigned, falling listlessly down by her side, and her right hand still clasped in that of Tabitha, who continued to stand by her side. No word was spoken between them as yet. Eudora was buried in profound, agonizing and bewildering thought, such as always overwhelms the sensitive victim of any sudden and crushing misfortune. The shock of the thunderbolt that had just fallen upon her, devastating her inner life, and leaving the outer so still, and black, and threatening: the vast, dark, sombre room; the dead silence around her—all combined to shake her reason to its centre. In the confusion wrought among nerves, head and brain by this inner storm of sensation, thought and suffering, she was fast losing confidence in heaven, trust in the reality of external circumstances, and even faith in her own identity.
Suddenly she threw herself forward, and tightened her clasp upon Tabitha’s hand, with convulsive tone, exclaiming:
“Wake me! wake me, Tabitha! I have the nightmare, and cannot rouse myself. Oh, wake me! wake me, for the love of Heaven!”
Tabitha, whom respect for her mistress’s sorrow had hitherto kept silent, now became alarmed for her sanity.
Bending over her with an almost reverential tenderness, she whispered:
“Dear young lady, try to be composed and collect your thoughts, and remember yourself.”
“Oh, Heaven! I remember too well! too well!” cried Eudora, in a piercing voice, dropping her face into her hands, and shuddering through her whole frame. “It is no horrible illusion! It is an awful reality! My aunt and cousin are really dead, and I am arrested upon the charge of poisoning them! Oh, horrible! most horrible! Oh, I shall go mad! I shall go mad!” she exclaimed, starting from her chair, casting up her arms, and throwing herself forward upon the floor.