and distinctly descended. Then the dreadful footsteps were heard advancing
along the little narrow passage to the door. The steps--oh heavens!
_whose_ steps?--have paused at the door. The very breathing can be heard
of that dreadful being, who has silenced all breathing except his own in
the house. There is but a door between him and Mary. What is he doing on
the other side of the door? A cautious step, a stealthy step it was that
came down the stairs, then paced along the little narrow passage--narrow
as a coffin--till at last the step pauses at the door. How hard the fellow
breathes! He, the solitary murderer, is on one side the door; Mary is on
the other side. Now, suppose that he should suddenly open the door, and
that incautiously in the dark Mary should rush in, and find herself in the
arms of the murderer. Thus far the case is a possible one--that to a
certainty, had this little trick been tried immediately upon Mary's
return, it would have succeeded; had the door been opened suddenly upon
her first tingle-tingle, headlong she would have tumbled in, and perished.
But now Mary is upon her guard. The unknown murderer and she have both
their lips upon the door, listening, breathing hard; but luckily they are
on different sides of the door; and upon the least indication of unlocking
or unlatching, she would have recoiled into the asylum of general
darkness.

What was the murderer's meaning in coming along the passage to the front
door? The meaning was this: separately, as an individual, Mary was worth
nothing at all to him. But, considered as a member of a household, she had
this value, viz., that she, if caught and murdered, perfected and rounded
the desolation of the house. The case being reported, as reported it would
be all over Christendom, led the imagination captive. The whole covey of
victims was thus netted; the household ruin was thus full and orbicular;
and in that proportion the tendency of men and women, flutter as they
might, would be helplessly and hopelessly to sink into the all-conquering