hio and his behaviour in the corridor,
a few preceding nights, the latter supposition, horrible as it was,
strengthened in her belief. Yet, why remove her from the castle,
where deeds of darkness had, she feared, been often executed with
secrecy?--from chambers, perhaps

With many a foul, and midnight murder stain'd.

The dread of what she might be going to encounter was now so excessive,
that it sometimes threatened her senses; and, often as she went, she
thought of her late father and of all he would have suffered, could he
have foreseen the strange and dreadful events of her future life;
and how anxiously he would have avoided that fatal confidence, which
committed his daughter to the care of a woman so weak as was Madame
Montoni. So romantic and improbable, indeed, did her present situation
appear to Emily herself, particularly when she compared it with the
repose and beauty of her early days, that there were moments, when she
could almost have believed herself the victim of frightful visions,
glaring upon a disordered fancy.

Restrained by the presence of her guides from expressing her terrors,
their acuteness was, at length, lost in gloomy despair. The dreadful
view of what might await her hereafter rendered her almost indifferent
to the surrounding dangers. She now looked, with little emotion, on the
wild dingles, and the gloomy road and mountains, whose outlines were
only distinguishable through the dusk;--objects, which but lately had
affected her spirits so much, as to awaken horrid views of the future,
and to tinge these with their own gloom.

It was now so nearly dark, that the travellers, who proceeded only by
the slowest pace, could scarcely discern their way. The clouds, which
seemed charged with thunder, passed slowly along the heavens, shewing,
at intervals, the trembling stars; while the groves of cypress and
sycamore, that overhung the rocks, waved high in the breeze, as it swept
over the glen, and then rushed among the distant woods. Emily shivered
as it passed.

'Where is the torch?' said Ugo, 'It grows dark.'

'Not so dark yet,' replied Bertrand, 'but we may find our way, and 'tis
best not light the torch, before we can help, for it may betray us, if
any straggling party of the enemy is abroad.'

Ugo muttered something, which Emily did not understand, and they
proceeded in darkness, while she almost wished, that the enemy might
discover them; for from change there was something to hope, s