d Mary. The least
indiscretion would be failure, and failure destruction.

I answered her perplexed solicitudes by telling her that I was not very
well--that I was uneasy; but I did not fail to extract from her a promise
that she would not hint to mortal, either my suspicions about Dudley, or
our rencontre with Meg Hawkes.

I remember how, when, after we had got, late at night, into bed, I sat up,
shivering with horror, in mine, while honest Mary's tranquil breathing told
how soundly she slept. I got up, and looked from the window, expecting to
see some of those wolfish dogs which they had brought to the place prowling
about the court-yard. Sometimes I prayed, and felt tranquillised, and
fancied that I was perhaps to have a short interval of sleep. But the
serenity was delusive, and all the time my nerves were strung hysterically.
Sometimes I felt quite wild, and on the point of screaming. At length that
dreadful night passed away. Morning came, and a less morbid, though hardly
a less terrible state of mind. Madame paid me an early visit. A thought
struck me. I knew that she loved shopping, and I said, quite carelessly--

'Your yesterday's shopping tempts me, Madame, and I must get a few things
before we leave for France. Suppose we go into Feltram to-day, and make my
purchases, you and I?'

She looked from the corner of her cunning eye in my face without answering.
I did not blench, and she said--

'Vary good. I would be vary 'appy,' and again she looked oddly at me.

'Wat hour, my dear Maud? One o'clock? I think that weel de very well, eh?'

I assented, and she grew silent.

I wonder whether I did look as careless as I tried. I do not know. Through
the whole of this awful period I was, I think, supernatural; and I even now
look back with wonder upon my strange self-command.

Madame, I hoped, had heard nothing of the order which prohibited my exit
from the place. She would herself conduct me to Feltram, and secure, by
accompanying me, my free egress.

Once in Feltram, I would assert my freedom, and manage to reach my dear
cousin Knollys. Back to Bartram no power should convey me. My heart swelled
and fluttered in the awful suspense of that hour.

Oh, Bartram-Haugh! how came you by those lofty walls? Which of my ancestors
had begirt me with an impassable barrier in this horrible strait?

Suddenly I remembered my letter to Lady Knollys. If I were disappointed in
effecting my escape through Feltram, all would