dog--"Good dog--good dog!"

But more than envy kept him lingering there: the wretched man did it for
delay--yes, though morn was breaking on the hills--one more--one more
moment of most precious time.




CHAPTER XXX.

SECOND THOUGHTS.


FOR--again he must go through that room!

No other entrance is open--not a window, not a door: all close as a
prison: and only by the way he went, by the same must he return.

He trembled all over, as a palsied man, when he touched the lock: with
stiffening hair, and staring eyes, he peeped in at that well-remembered
chamber: he entered--and crept close up to the corpse, stealthily and
dreadingly--horror! what if she be alive still?

SHE WAS.

Not quite dead--not quite dead yet! a gurgling in the bruised throat--a
shadowy gleam of light and life in those protruded eyes--an irregular
convulsive heaving at the chest: she might recover! what a fearful
hope: and, if she did, would hang him--ha! he went nearer; she was