She was weeping still, not with intermittent sobs, no longer with any bitterness, but as a child, with soft, child-like little sounds, gently groaning, her bosom heaving with faint, undulating motions. It was a weeping in which something like a little laugh resounded, a little laugh of insanity. Then she grew quiet, and she nestled herself with her head in her arms, still on the floor by the open window. She never moved, desperate with terror at her surroundings, desperate with terror at what was to come. It seemed to her as if throughout her frame there foamed and seethed a dark and stormy sea, which engulfed every thought in her brain, and into which she gradually sunk away. And with all her last remaining energy she tried to struggle against that sea, but its pressure was too heavy, and she fell, fell back utterly exhausted, utterly unnerved, hopelessly dulled by a stormy hissing in her ears and in her brain.
“Great God! great God!” she groaned in a voice that was growing weaker and hoarser with every moment, a voice full of a wild despair that had no longer the power of utterance. Then, drop by drop, slowly and gently, her consciousness flowed away, and she slept—the sleep of Eternity!
The street-lamp was extinguished, and the big room was now dark as a grave. A mausoleum of impenetrable blackness in the midst of which, white and shadowy, lay a corpse. Then the chillness of the night entered into the apartment, and slowly the pearl gray mist of daybreak arose to dispel the heavy gloom.
THE END.
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D. APPLETON & CO.’S PUBLICATIONS.
THE FAITH DOCTOR. By Edward Eggleston, author of “The Hoosier Schoolmaster,” “The Circuit Rider,” etc. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
“An excellent piece of work.… With each new novel the author of ‘The Hoosier Schoolmaster’ enlarges his audience, and surprises old friends by reserve forces unsuspected. Sterling integrity of character and high moral motives illuminate Dr. Eggleston’s fiction, and assure its place in the literature of America which is to stand as a worthy reflex of the best thoughts of this age.”—New York World.
“One of the novels of the decade.”—Rochester Union and Advertiser.