'It would have another taste--I could
not touch it. I want but a minute's rest. Nothing but that.'
Miss Haredale stood beside her chair, regarding her with silent pity.
She remained for a little time quite still; then rose and turned to Mr
Haredale, who had sat down in his easy chair, and was contemplating her
with fixed attention.
The tale connected with the mansion borne in mind, it seemed, as has
been already said, the chosen theatre for such a deed as it had known.
The room in which this group were now assembled--hard by the very
chamber where the act was done--dull, dark, and sombre; heavy with
worm-eaten books; deadened and shut in by faded hangings, muffling every
sound; shadowed mournfully by trees whose rustling boughs gave ever and
anon a spectral knocking at the glass; wore, beyond all others in
the house, a ghostly, gloomy air. Nor were the group assembled there,
unfitting tenants of the spot. The widow, with her marked and startling
face and downcast eyes; Mr Haredale stern and despondent ever; his niece
beside him, like, yet most unlike, the picture of her father, which
gazed reproachfully down upon them from the blackened wall; Barnaby,
with his vacant look and restless eye; were all in keeping with the
place, and actors in the legend.
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