To weigh such a question
impartially was impossible; for in the one alternative no hurt would
befall the marquis, while from the other her very soul recoiled
sickening. Thus tortured, she sat motionless in the very den of the
dragon, the one moment vainly endeavouring to rouse up her courage
and look her duty in the face that she might know with certainty
what it was; the next, feeling her whole nature rise rebellious
against the fate that demanded such a sacrifice. Ought she to be
thus punished for an intent of the purest humanity?
There came a lull, and with the lull a sense of her position: she
sat in the very, jaws of slander! Any moment mistress Watson or
another might enter and find her there, and what then more natural
or irrefutable than the accusation of having liberated him? She
sprang to her feet, and darted to the door. It was locked!
Her first thought was relief: she had no longer to decide; her
second, that she was a prisoner--till, horror of horrors! the
soldiers of the guard came to seek Richard and found her, or stern
mistress Watson appeared, grim as one of the Fates; or, perhaps, if
Richard had been carried away, until she was compelled by hunger and
misery to call aloud for release.
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