“He would fly me—”
“Oh—be silent.”
“Help—help—for pity’s sake!”
“Ah!”
Then came the alarmed puritans, running in from all sides. From the house—from the garden—over the walls they streamed—nearer and nearer, till they surrounded the lover and his mad bride.
While he, all his fear merged in overwhelming sorrow, stood gazing at her who was then his ruin; for had she not called his dread enemies about him?
Amongst the rest came Captain Richard Forth. And as he saw his enemy in his power—his enemy wearing his sword, and come secretly in the night-time from the puritan camp—he saw he was unworthy to live, and he cried, “The ungodly shall perish from off the face of the earth. Thou hast crept to death, Arthur Talbot; thou hast crept here to death!”
The dreadful word made a dreadful impression on the lady. She trembled violently, pressed her hands about her head, and uttered the word over and over again. Was this the great terror that might save her? The learned doctor had said a sudden joy or terror might restore her.
“Arthur,” she cried at last, in a tone far different from that in which she had spoken to him but a minute since, and fell upon his breast. She was saved! So he had returned to restore her to reason, and she—she had destroyed him.
Even in the one word, “Arthur,” she betrayed him.