however, she acquired fortitude enough to speak of her
father, and to give a brief account of the manner of his death; during
which recital Valancourt's countenance betrayed strong emotion, and,
when he heard that St. Aubert had died on the road, and that Emily
had been left among strangers, he pressed her hand between his, and
involuntarily exclaimed, 'Why was I not there!' but in the next moment
recollected himself, for he immediately returned to the mention of her
father; till, perceiving that her spirits were exhausted, he gradually
changed the subject, and spoke of himself. Emily thus learned that,
after they had parted, he had wandered, for some time, along the shores
of the Mediterranean, and had then returned through Languedoc into
Gascony, which was his native province, and where he usually resided.

When he had concluded his little narrative, he sunk into a silence,
which Emily was not disposed to interrupt, and it continued, till they
reached the gate of the chateau, when he stopped, as if he had known
this to be the limit of his walk. Here, saying, that it was his
intention to return to Estuviere on the following day, he asked her if
she would permit him to take leave of her in the morning; and Emily,
perceiving that she could not reject an ordinary civility, without
expressing by her refusal an expectation of something more, was
compelled to answer, that she should be at home.

She passed a melancholy evening, during which the retrospect of all
that had happened, since she had seen Valancourt, would rise to her
imagination; and the scene of her father's death appeared in tints
as fresh, as if it had passed on the preceding day. She remembered
particularly the earnest and solemn manner, in which he had required her
to destroy the manuscript papers, and, awakening from the lethargy,
in which sorrow had held her, she was shocked to think she had not yet
obeyed him, and determined, that another day should not reproach her
with the neglect.

CHAPTER X

Can such things be,
And overcome us like a summer's cloud,
Without our special wonder?
MACBETH

On the next morning, Emily ordered a fire to be lighted in the stove
of the chamber, where St. Aubert used to sleep; and, as soon as she had
breakfasted, went thither to burn the papers. Having fastened the
door to prevent interruption, she opened the closet where they were
concealed, as she entered which, she felt an emotion of unusual awe,
an