marble.




XIII.


"And _she_ was standing there all the time," said Connie, crying and
telling her little tale after Mary had been carried away,--"standing with
her hand upon that cabinet, looking and looking, oh, as if she wanted to
say something and couldn't. Why couldn't she, mamma? Oh, Mr. Bowyer, why
couldn't she, if she wanted so much? Why wouldn't God let her speak?"




XIV.


Mary had a long illness, and hovered on the verge of death. She said a
great deal in her wanderings about some one who had looked at her. "For a
moment, a moment," she would cry; "only a moment! and I had so much to
say." But as she got better, nothing was said to her about this face she
had seen. And perhaps it was only the suggestion of some feverish dream.
She was taken away, and was a long time getting up her strength; and in
the meantime the Turners insisted that the chains should be thoroughly
seen to, which were not all in a perfect state. And the earl coming to
see the place, took a fancy to it, and determined to keep it in his own
hands. He was a friendly person, and his ideas of decoration were quite