Maud passed her hand across her eyes for several moments as if trying to clear the mist that beset her memory and mental faculties. Then she said,—
“Where is he?”
“The man you were talking with?”
“Yes, Britton, the savage smith of Learmont.”
“He has fled.”
“Yes—yes—fled. He was pursued by the dead man asking for his child.”
“What child?” said Ada, in a voice trembling with anxiety.
“I saw its little arms cling round its father’s murderer. I heard him shriek—I heard him say the hell of conscience had began its awful work within his guilty breast.”
“The child—the child,” cried Ada,—“what was its name? Oh, tell me, if you can, its name?”
“Its name,” repeated Maud. “It was the child of the dead. It—it reminded me of my own. Listen! When I was young—for I was young once—and my hair hung in long silken rights from my brow, when my eyes danced in the pure light of heaven, and my heart mounted with joy, singing like the lark that carries its sweet notes even to the gates of heaven. Long—long ago I clasped to my breast such a dear child as that. So you see it reminded me of my own dear infant.”