delicacy, she did
not appear to observe her aunt's distress, but it gave an involuntary
gentleness to her manners, and an air of solicitude to her countenance,
which Madame Montoni was vexed to perceive, who seemed to feel the pity
of her niece to be an insult to her pride, and dismissed her as soon
as she properly could. Emily did not venture to mention again the
reluctance she felt to her gloomy chamber, but she requested that
Annette might be permitted to remain with her till she retired to rest;
and the request was somewhat reluctantly granted. Annette, however, was
now with the servants, and Emily withdrew alone.

With light and hasty steps she passed through the long galleries, while
the feeble glimmer of the lamp she carried only shewed the gloom
around her, and the passing air threatened to extinguish it. The lonely
silence, that reigned in this part of the castle, awed her; now and
then, indeed, she heard a faint peal of laughter rise from a remote part
of the edifice, where the servants were assembled, but it was soon lost,
and a kind of breathless stillness remained. As she passed the suite of
rooms which she had visited in the morning, her eyes glanced fearfully
on the door, and she almost fancied she heard murmuring sounds within,
but she paused not a moment to enquire.

Having reached her own apartment, where no blazing wood on the
hearth dissipated the gloom, she sat down with a book, to enliven her
attention, till Annette should come, and a fire could be kindled. She
continued to read till her light was nearly expired, but Annette did not
appear, and the solitude and obscurity of her chamber again affected her
spirits, the more, because of its nearness to the scene of horror, that
she had witnessed in the morning. Gloomy and fantastic images came to
her mind. She looked fearfully towards the door of the stair-case, and
then, examining whether it was still fastened, found that it was so.
Unable to conquer the uneasiness she felt at the prospect of sleeping
again in this remote and insecure apartment, which some person seemed to
have entered during the preceding night, her impatience to see Annette,
whom she had bidden to enquire concerning this circumstance, became
extremely painful. She wished also to question her, as to the object,
which had excited so much horror in her own mind, and which Annette on
the preceding evening had appeared to be in part acquainted with, though
her words were very remote fr