And thus, determined by his devoted attention to lull her slightest doubts to rest, he set out early the following morning for the parsonage.
This was Thursday—the day on which Mrs. Courtney had promised to visit the isle.
The day dawned clear and beautiful, and as the family at the Brantwell mansion assembled round the breakfast-table, little did they dream of the appalling tragedy with which it was destined to close.
Sibyl and her lover sat in their favorite seat in the recess formed by the deep bay-window, talking in low, lover-like tones.
Good Mrs. Brantwell had incased her large proportions in a rocking-chair, and was swaying backward and forward, plying her knitting-needles, and trying to find some one to talk to—a somewhat difficult task; for Mr. Courtney, sitting in sullen silence, answered coldly and briefly, while his eyes continually followed his wife, who was fluttering in and out in a restless, breezy sort of way, looking every few moments out of the window, and starting violently whenever the door opened. Her husband saw it, and said to himself:
"She is looking for her lover, and is watching impatiently for his coming. This is the morning he promised to take her to the isle."
And his eyes assumed such a wild, maniac glare, that Mrs. Brantwell, looking up suddenly from her work, uttered a stifled scream as she exclaimed:
"Gracious me! Mr. Courtney, are you ill? You look like a ghost—worse than any ghost, I declare. I knew your wound was not perfectly healed. You had better retire, and lie down."
"Thank you, madam; I am perfectly well," he answered, in a hollow tone that belied his words.
Laura, absorbed by her own thoughts, had not heard this brief conversation. Yes, she was watching for Captain Campbell, with a nervous restlessness, she could not control, but, with a far different object to that which her husband supposed. She wanted to see him for a moment, before he entered, to tell him she could not go with him, to the island, and, to beg of him, not to allude to the subject in the presence of the others. If he did, she knew her husband's jealousy would be apparent to all—a humiliation, she wished to postpone, as long as possible.