The Mysteries of Udolpho

While Dorothee spoke, Emily was still looking on the lute, which was a

Spanish one, and remarkably large; and then, with a hesitating hand,

she took it up, and passed her fingers over the chords. They were out

of tune, but uttered a deep and full sound. Dorothee started at their

well-known tones, and, seeing the lute in Emily's hand, said, 'This is

the lute my lady Marchioness loved so! I remember when last she played

upon it--it was on the night that she died. I came as usual to undress

her, and, as I entered the bed-chamber, I heard the sound of music from

the oriel, and perceiving it was my lady's, who was sitting there, I

stepped softly to the door, which stood a little open, to listen; for

the music--though it was mournful--was so sweet! There I saw her, with

the lute in her hand, looking upwards, and the tears fell upon her

cheeks, while she sung a vesper hymn, so soft, and so solemn! and her

voice trembled, as it were, and then she would stop for a moment, and

wipe away her tears, and go on again, lower than before. O! I had often

listened to my lady, but never heard any thing so sweet as this; it made

me cry, almost, to hear it. She had been at prayers, I fancy, for there

was the book open on the table beside her--aye, and there it lies open

still! Pray, let us leave the oriel, ma'amselle,' added Dorothee, 'this

is a heart-breaking place!'

Having returned into the chamber, she desired to look once more upon

the bed, when, as they came opposite to the open door, leading into

the saloon, Emily, in the partial gleam, which the lamp threw into it,

thought she saw something glide along into the obscurer part of the

room. Her spirits had been much affected by the surrounding scene, or it

is probable this circumstance, whether real or imaginary, would not have

affected her in the degree it did; but she endeavoured to conceal her

emotion from Dorothee, who, however, observing her countenance change,

enquired if she was ill. 'Let us go,' said Emily, faintly, 'the air of these rooms is

unwholesome;' but, when she attempted to do so, considering that she

must pass through the apartment where the phantom of her terror had

appeared, this terror increased, and, too faint to support herself, she

sad down on the side of the bed.

Dorothee, believing that she was only affected by a consideration of the

melancholy catastrophe, which had happened on this spot, endeavoured

to cheer her; and then, as they sat together on the bed, she began to

relate other particulars concerning it, and this without reflecting,

that it might increase Emily's emotion, but because they were

particularly interesting to herself. 'A little before my lady's death,'

said she, 'when the pains were gone off, she called me to her, and

stretching out her hand to me, I sat down just there--where the curtain

falls upon the bed. How well I remember her look at the time--death

was in it!--I can almost fancy I see her now.--There she lay,

ma'amselle--her face was upon the pillow there! This black counterpane

was not upon the bed then; it was laid on, after her death, and she was

laid out upon it.'