"If only he would come!" she sighed.... "Ah, I am afraid! I am afraid!... I am terribly afraid!"
Elizabeth stood motionless—a frozen image of fear—all but her eyes: they were casting terrified glances about her....
And no wonder! Elizabeth was neatness personified, and her room was kept with exquisite care—but now, everything was in the greatest disorder.... The drawers of her chest of drawers were piled one on top of the other in a corner of the room; their contents were thrown down in heaps a little way off; books had been cast pell-mell on a sofa; a great wicker trunk, wherein Elizabeth had packed numerous papers belonging to her brother, was overturned on the floor, the lid open.
Its contents were scattered near—a confused mass of documents and crumpled papers.
Elizabeth stared about her for a long minute, and again she cried:
"Oh, if only he would come! What is the meaning of all this?..."
She regained her self-control. Her usual expression of serene gravity returned.
"To go to sleep," she murmured. "That is the best thing—to-morrow will come more quickly so—and, oh, I am so sleepy, so very, very tired!"
Soon Elizabeth blew out her lamp—darkness reigned in her room.