ld burst from my
temples; and the next I felt a cold sweat on my forehead, and
a horrible fear creeping over my heart. I could not move, and
my tongue clave to the roof of my mouth; my eyes felt as if
they were starting out of my head, and I sought to close them
and could not. There was that torrent before them; it roared,
it foamed; and the foam looked like a shroud; and the roaring
of the waters sounded like a scream; and I screamed too--a
dreadful scream--and then all at once I grew calm; for there
were hurried steps on the gallery, and terror paralysed me. It
was the housekeeper and the doctor; as they came, the latter
said:--"Take the other child to her,--perhaps she will cry
when she sees her." And as I was trembling violently, and did
not seem to hear what they said to me, though I did hear every
word, the man took me up in his arms, and carried me like a
baby into the drawing-room. Mrs. Middleton was there with a
face paler than a sheet; when she saw me her mouth quivered,
but she did not speak or cry; she waved her hand, and then
laid her head again against the open door, and seemed to
listen with her heart. I felt as if I could hear it beat where
I sat. Five or six minutes passed, and then Mr. Middleton
rushed into the room. She looked up into his face and
shrieked--the same fearful shriek I had heard once before. He
took her hands, which she was wringing wildly, and putting his
arm round her, he whispered, "Now, Mary, all is over; show me
that you believe in God." She struggled for a moment, her
chest heaved convulsively, and then she burst into a violent
fit of hysterical crying. He supported her out of the room,
and they went away together. The housekeeper came up to the
sofa where I was, and taking one of my hands, she said, "And
where were you when the poor thing fell?"

I started up as if she had shot me; I rushed out of the room,
across the hall, through the winding passages, and up the
stairs into my own room. I locked the door, and falling on my
knees with my face against the bed-post, I pressed my temples
with my hands as if to still their throbbing. During the next
two or three hours, each knock at my door made me jump as if a
cannon had gone off at my ear; each time I opened it I
expected to be accused of Julia's death,--to be told that I
had killed her; and once, when it was my uncle's step that I
heard approaching, I opened my window, and was on the point of
throwing myself out of it: strang