"How very cold!" I exclaimed, holding it between both my own, with the

vain idea of warming it. "What can be the reason? It is really

deathlike!"

"The extremities die first, they say," answered Zenobia, laughing. "And

so you kiss this poor, despised, rejected hand! Well, my dear friend,

I thank you. You have reserved your homage for the fallen. Lip of man

will never touch my hand again. I intend to become a Catholic, for the

sake of going into a nunnery. When you next hear of Zenobia, her face

will be behind the black veil; so look your last at it now,--for all is

over. Once more, farewell!"

She withdrew her hand, yet left a lingering pressure, which I felt long

afterwards. So intimately connected as I had been with perhaps the

only man in whom she was ever truly interested, Zenobia looked on me as

the representative of all the past, and was conscious that, in bidding

me adieu, she likewise took final leave of Hollingsworth, and of this

whole epoch of her life. Never did her beauty shine out more

lustrously than in the last glimpse that I had of her. She departed,

and was soon hidden among the trees.

But, whether it was the strong

impression of the foregoing scene, or whatever else the cause, I was

affected with a fantasy that Zenobia had not actually gone, but was

still hovering about the spot and haunting it. I seemed to feel her

eyes upon me. It was as if the vivid coloring of her character had

left a brilliant stain upon the air. By degrees, however, the

impression grew less distinct. I flung myself upon the fallen leaves

at the base of Eliot's pulpit. The sunshine withdrew up the tree

trunks and flickered on the topmost boughs; gray twilight made the wood

obscure; the stars brightened out; the pendent boughs became wet with

chill autumnal dews. But I was listless, worn out with emotion on my

own behalf and sympathy for others, and had no heart to leave my

comfortless lair beneath the rock.

I must have fallen asleep, and had a dream, all the circumstances of

which utterly vanished at the moment when they converged to some

tragical catastrophe, and thus grew too powerful for the thin sphere of

slumber that enveloped them. Starting from the ground, I found the

risen moon shining upon the rugged face of the rock, and myself all in

a tremble.




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