Bernard returned, as we have seen, to the Governor, for the further development of his diabolical designs, and in a short time Berkenhead, under a guard of soldiers, was conducted to his quarters for the night, in a store-house which stood in the yard some distance from the house.
As the house to which the renegade insurgent was consigned was deemed sufficiently secure, and the soldiers wearied with a long march, were again to proceed on their journey on the morrow, it was not considered necessary to place a guard before the door of this temporary cell—the precaution, however, being taken to appoint a sentry at each side of the mansion-house, and at the door of the apartment in which the unhappy Hansford was confined.
FOOTNOTES:
[43] An old English expression for a rough, honest fellow.
[44] A bludgeon.
[45] There may be danger in the design.
CHAPTER XXX.
“Ha! sure he sleeps—all's dark within save what
A lamp, that feebly lifts a sickly flame,
By fits reveals. His face seems turned to favour
The attempt. I'll steal and do it unperceived.”
Mourning Bride.
All were wrapt in silence and in slumber, save the weary sentinels, who paced drowsily up and down before the door of the house, humming in a low tone the popular Lillibullero, or silently communing with their brother sentry in the sky. The family, providing for the fatigues of the following day, had early retired to rest, and even Virginia, worn down by excitement and agitation, having been assured by her father of the certain safety of Hansford, had yielded to the restoring influences of sleep. How little did the artless girl, or her unsuspicious father, suppose that beneath their roof they had been cherishing a demon, who, by his wily machinations, was weaving a web around his innocent victim, cruel and inextricable.