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The Evil Guest by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
page 37 of 167 (22%)
consistent; all the circumstances bore plainly in the same direction; the
evidence was conclusive; and Mrs. Marston's thoughts and feelings
respecting her fair young confidante quickly found their old level, and
flowed on tranquilly and sadly in their accustomed channel.

While Mademoiselle de Barras was thus, with the persevering industry of
the spider, repairing the meshes which a chance breath had shattered, she
would, perhaps, have been in her turn shocked and startled, could she
have glanced into Marston's mind, and seen, in what was passing there,
the real extent of her danger.

Marston was walking, as usual, alone, and in the most solitary region of
his lonely park. One hand grasped his walking stick, not to lean upon it,
but as if it were the handle of a battle-axe; the other was buried in his
bosom; his dark face looked upon the ground, and he strode onward with a
slow but energetic step, which had the air of deep resolution. He found
himself at last in a little churchyard, lying far among the wild forest
of his demesne, and in the midst of which, covered with ivy and tufted
plants, now ruddy with autumnal tints, stood the ruined walls of a little
chapel. In the dilapidated vault close by lay buried many of his
ancestors, and under the little wavy hillocks of fern and nettles, slept
many an humble villager. He sat down upon a worn tombstone in this lowly
ruin, and with his eyes fixed upon the ground, he surrendered his spirit
to the stormy and evil thoughts which he had invited. Long and motionless
he sat there, while his foul fancies and schemes began to assume shape
and order. The wind rushing through the ivy roused him for a moment, and
as he raised his gloomy eye it alighted accidentally upon a skull, which
some wanton hand had fixed in a crevice of the wall. He averted his
glance quickly, but almost as quickly refixed his gaze upon the impassive
symbol of death, with an expression glowering and contemptuous, and with
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