ose, chilling
me with an unutterable awe, forcing on me the conviction of an unseen
design in the long series of complications which had now fastened round
us. I thought of Hartright--as I saw him in the body when he said
farewell; as I saw him in the spirit in my dream--and I too began to
doubt now whether we were not advancing blindfold to an appointed and
an inevitable end.

Leaving Laura to go upstairs alone, I went out to look about me in the
walks near the house. The circumstances under which Anne Catherick had
parted from her had made me secretly anxious to know how Count Fosco
was passing the afternoon, and had rendered me secretly distrustful of
the results of that solitary journey from which Sir Percival had
returned but a few hours since.

After looking for them in every direction and discovering nothing, I
returned to the house, and entered the different rooms on the ground
floor one after another. They were all empty. I came out again into
the hall, and went upstairs to return to Laura. Madame Fosco opened
her door as I passed it in my way along the passage, and I stopped to
see if she could inform me of the whereabouts of her husband and Sir
Percival. Yes, she had seen them both from her window more than an
hour since. The Count had looked up with his customary kindness, and
had mentioned with his habitual attention to her in the smallest
trifles, that he and his friend were going out together for a long walk.

For a long walk! They had never yet been in each other's company with
that object in my experience of them. Sir Percival cared for no
exercise but riding, and the Count (except when he was polite enough to
be my escort) cared for no exercise at all.

When I joined Laura again, I found that she had called to mind in my
absence the impending question of the signature to the deed, which, in
the interest of discussing her interview with Anne Catherick, we had
hitherto overlooked. Her first words when I saw her expressed her
surprise at the absence of the expected summons to attend Sir Percival
in the library.

"You may make your mind easy on that subject," I said. "For the
present, at least, neither your resolution nor mine will be exposed to
any further trial. Sir Percival has altered his plans--the business
of the signature is put off."

"Put off?" Laura repeated amazedly. "Who told you so?"

"My authority is Count Fosco. I believe it is to his interference that
we are indebted f