This seemed to annoy the poor creature—soothsaying, by palmistry, had been her weakness in her brighter days, and now the strange propensity clung to her through the dark night of her sorrows, and received strength from her insanity.
"Come in, dear Fanny," said Edith, "come in and stay with us."
"No, no!" she almost shrieked again. "I should bring a curse upon your house! Oh! I could tell you if you would hear! I could warn you, if you would be warned! But you will not! you will not!" she continued, wringing her hands in great trouble.
"You shall predict my fate and Miriam's," said Marian, smiling, as she opened the gate, and came out leading the child. "And I know," she continued, holding out her palm, "that it will be such a fair fate, as to brighten up your spirits for sympathy with it."
"No! I will not look at your hand!" cried Fanny, turning away. Then, suddenly changing her mood, she snatched Marian's palm, and gazed upon it long and intently; gradually her features became disturbed—dark shadows seemed to sweep, as a funereal train, across her face—her bosom heaved—she dropped the maiden's hand.
"Why, Fanny, you have told me nothing! What do you see in my future?" asked Marian.
The maniac looked up, and breaking, as she sometimes did, into improvisation, chanted, in the most mournful of tones, these words:
"Darkly, deadly, lowers the shadow,
Quickly, thickly, comes the crowd—
From death's bosom creeps the adder,
Trailing slime upon the shroud!"
Marian grew pale, so much, at the moment, was she infected with the words and manner of this sybil; but then, "Nonsense!" she thought, and, with a smile, roused herself to shake off the chill that was creeping upon her.
"Feel! the air! the air!" said Fanny, lifting her hand.