Without a change in her face, without a movement in her limbs, she spoke the fatal words:
“I have come from a Refuge, and I am going back to a Refuge. Mr. Horace Holmcroft, I am Mercy Merrick.”
CHAPTER XXVI. GREAT HEART AND LITTLE HEART.
THERE was a pause.
The moments passed—and not one of the three moved. The moments passed—and not one of the three spoke. Insensibly the words of supplication died away on Julian’s lips. Even his energy failed to sustain him, tried as it now was by the crushing oppression of suspense. The first trifling movement which suggested the idea of change, and which so brought with it the first vague sense of relief, came from Mercy. Incapable of sustaining the prolonged effort of standing, she drew back a little and took a chair. No outward manifestation of emotion escaped her. There she sat—with the death-like torpor of resignation in her face—waiting her sentence in silence from the man at whom she had hurled the whole terrible confession of the truth in one sentence!
Julian lifted his head as she moved. He looked at Horace, and advancing a few steps, looked again. There was fear in his face, as he suddenly turned it toward Mercy.
“Speak to him!” he said, in a whisper. “Rouse him, before it’s too late!”
She moved mechanically in her chair; she looked mechanically at Julian.
“What more have I to say to him?” she asked, in faint, weary tones. “Did I not tell him everything when I told him my name?”