Fettered, cruelly constrained by threats and wily sermons upon her duty
to her family, terrorized, a prisoner 'beside this blue lake, in sight of
the sublimest scenery of earth,' and hating his associate--hating him,
she repeated and underscored--she had belied herself; she was willing to
meet Alvan, she wished to meet him. She could open her heart to Alvan's
true friend--his only true friend. He would instantly discern her
unhappy plight. In the presence of his associate she could explain
nothing, do nothing but what she had done. He had frozen her. She had
good reason to know that man for her enemy. She could prove him a
traitor to Alvan. Certain though she was from the first moment of Dr.
Storchel's integrity and kindness of heart, she had stood petrified
before him, as if affected by some wicked spell. She owned she had
utterly belied herself; she protested she had been no free agent.

The future labours in her cause were thrown upon Dr. Storchel's
shoulders, but with such compliments to him on his mission from above
as emissary angels are presumed to be sensibly affected by.

The letter was long, involved, rather eloquent when she forgot herself
and wrote herself, and intentionally very feminine, after the manner of
supplicatory ladies appealing to lawyers, whom they would sway by the
feeble artlessness of a sex that must confide in their possession of a
heart, their heads being too awful.

She was directing the letter when Marko Romaris gave his name outside her
door. He was her intimate, her trustiest ally; he was aware of her
design to communicate with Dr. Storchel, and came to tell her it would be
a waste of labour. He stood there singularly pale and grave, unlike the
sprightly slave she petted on her search for a tyrant. 'Too late,' he
said, pointing to the letter she held. 'Dr. Storchel has gone.'