With tremulous voice, and as if urged by some invisible power, the Duke shrieked forth—
“I would know my doom—I would know my fate!”
The hood fell back from the head of the Spectre, and its arms slowly extended!
“O Jesu!” shrieked the Duke,—“Look, look! the skeleton hands, the fleshless skull, the hollow eyes! One hand grasps a cross, and one a grinning skull.—Look, look!”
“Speak not!” whispered the Monk, “speak not upon pain of eternal doom!”
The voice again sounded through the cell.
“Dost thou seek in the name of the Holy One? Dost thou ask trusting in his Saints?”
“I do!”
“Thou art answered!” and the bare and hideous bones of the spectre head were covered, quick as a flash of light, with ruddy and healthy flesh, the hollow sockets gleamed with dark and brilliant orbs, and the skeleton hands glowed with life, as a skin of rosy loveliness shrouded the disjointed bones.
“Thou art answered!” and as the spectre whispered the words, a skeleton form came gliding along the mirror, holding an hour-glass in its fleshless hand.