The mouth, too, was a
little open. Was it the moonlight that gave her that death-like look? or
was she dead indeed?
The young man broke out into a long, wavering cry. It was not weeping;
it was not laughter; yet it bore a resemblance to both. It curdled his
own blood, but he could not repress it. It was the voice of
overstrained, unendurable emotion, and a horrible voice it was to hear.
He feared he was losing his senses--looking in that white, motionless
face, and uttering such a cry! At last, however, it died away, and there
was silence. The silence was almost worse than the cry--the utter
silence of a winter night.
"What shall I do?" he said to himself, helplessly.
The unearthly voice, and the discovery to which it had led, following
the other events of the night, had made Bressant unfit to deal with this
matter after his usual ready and practical style. But he would have
found the problem an awkward one at his best. How could he appear at the
Parsonage? What account could he give there of this lifeless body? What
account could he give of it to himself? He was utterly bewildered and
aghast. It seemed that the dead had risen from the grave, to drag him
relentlessly back to the fullest glare of earthly ignominy--to the
keenest experience of human suffering.
Pages:
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360