Then Salina spoke, and denounced herself. After all the pains she had taken to conceal her agency in Sprowl's escape,—inconsistent, impetuous, filled with rage against herself and him,—she exclaimed,—
"I did it! Here is the knife I gave him!"
Virginia stood white and dumb, looking at her sister. Toby could only tear his old white wool and groan.
"Salina," said her father, solemnly, "you have done a very treacherous and wicked thing! I pity you!"
Severest reproaches could not have stung her as these words, and the terrified look of her sister, stung the proud and sensitive Salina.
"I have done a damnable thing! I know it. Do you ask what made me? The devil made me. I knew it was the devil at the time; but I did it."
"O, what shall we do, father?" said Virginia.
"There is nothing you can do, my daughter, unless you can reach our friends and warn them."
"O," she said, in despair, "there is not a lamp or a torch! All have been taken!"
"And it is well! It would take you at least an hour to go and return; and that man—" Mr. Villars would never, if he could help it, speak Lysander's name—"will be here again before that time, if he is coming."