XXII. MARY'S EFFORTS TO PROVE AN ALIBI.
"There was a listening fear in her regard,
As if calamity had but begun;
As if the vanward clouds of evil days
Had spent their malice, and the sullen rear
Was, with its stored thunder, labouring up."
--KEATS' Hyperion.
No sooner was Mary alone than she fastened the door, and put the
shutters up against the window, which had all this time remained
shaded only by the curtains hastily drawn together on Esther's
entrance, and the lighting of the candle.
She did all this with the same compressed lips, and the same stony
look that her face had assumed on the first examination of the
paper. Then she sat down for an instant to think; and rising
directly, went, with a step rendered firm by inward resolution of
purpose, up the stairs; passed her own door, two steps, into her
father's room. What did she want there?
I must tell you; I must put into words the dreadful secret which she
believed that bit of paper had revealed to her.
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