m it a pistol; and, looking warily over her
shoulder to see that the door was closed, and cautiously up at the
windows, lest some eye might be spying her action even through the
thick blinds, she took the weapon in her hand and held it up so that
she might feel, if possible, how it would be with her when she should
attempt the deed. She looked very narrowly at the lock, of which
the trigger was already back at its place, so that no exertion of
arrangement might be necessary for her at the fatal moment. Never as
yet had she fired a pistol;--never before had she held such a weapon
in her hand;--but she thought that she could do it when her passion
ran high.

Then for the twentieth time she asked herself whether it would not
be easier to turn it against her own bosom,--against her own brain;
so that all might be over at once. Ah, yes;--so much easier! But how
then would it be with this man who had driven her, by his subtle
courage and persistent audacity, to utter destruction? Could he and
she be made to go down together in that boat which her fancy had
built for them, then indeed it might be well that she should seek her
own death. But were she now to destroy herself,--herself and only
herself,--then would her enemy be left to enjoy his rich prize, a
prize only the richer because she would have disappeared from the
world! And of her, if such had been her last deed, men would only
say that the mad Countess had gone on in her madness. With looks of
sad solemnity, but heartfelt satisfaction, all the Lovels, and that
wretched tailor, and her own daughter, would bestow some mock grief
on her funeral, and there would be an end for ever of Josephine
Countess Lovel,--and no one would remember her, or her deeds, or her
sufferings. When she wandered out from the house on that morning,
after hearing that Daniel Thwaite would be there at one, and had
walked nearly into the mid city so that she might not be watched,
and had bought her pistol and powder and bullets, and had then with
patience gone to work and taught herself how to prepare the weapon
for use, she certainly had not intended simply to make the triumph of
her enemy more easy.

And yet she knew well what was the penalty of murder, and she knew
also that there could be no chance of escape. Very often had she
turned it in her mind, whether she could not destroy the man so that
the hand of the destroyer might be hidden. But it could not be so.
She could not dog him in the s