Page:Lady Barbarity; a romance (IA ladybarbarityrom00snai).pdf/284

 hanged?" she asked, seeking for hope where hope was not.

"I am trusting so," says I, so cheerfully that my tears began to flow.

I soon came to the conclusion that my mood forbade repose, and therefore, instead of undressing and attempting to obtain a much-to-be-desired sleep, I dismissed poor Emblem, cast a cloak round my shoulders, took a chair by the hearth, and settled there for the remainder of the night, to doze, to think, and to repine.

However, this plan did not answer. It only induced a sickening course of meditation that was less endurable than the foulest nightmare. No matter what my posture, my agonies of mind grew unsupportable, and at last I cast the cloak off wearily, got up, and began to pace the chamber. It was while I was thus wrestling with my pains that I heard the far silence of the house disturbed by the closing of doors below. By the weight of the sounds and the jangling of the chains I presumed them to be those of the great hall, and as my window commanded the whole frontage of lawn and gravel sweep, I promptly pulled aside the curtains. Lanterns were twinkling immediately below, and by their aid and that of the clear-shining moon I was able to read the identity of two persons issuing from the house. They were the Captain and his prisoner, walking side by side across the lawn in a south-westerly direction. They were heading for the open meadows, and appeared perfectly amicable