ldered--speechless--instinctively shutting
my eyes--when I opened them again all was darkness--all was silence!
Only the wind howled outside more frantically than ever--a sweeping
gust whirled through the vault, blowing some dead leaves against my
face, and I heard the boughs of trees creaking noisily in the fury of
the storm. Hush!--was that a faint moan? Quivering in every limb, and
sick with a nameless dread, I sought in my pocket for matches--I found
them. Then with an effort, mastering the shuddering revulsion of my
nerves, I struck a light. The flame was so dim that for an instant I
could see nothing. I called loudly:

"Nina!" There was no answer.

One of the extinguished candles was near me; I lighted it with
trembling hands and held it aloft--then I uttered a wild shriek of
horror! Oh, God of inexorable justice, surely Thy vengeance was greater
than mine! An enormous block of stone, dislodged by the violence of the
storm, had fallen from the roof of the vault; fallen sheer down over
the very place where SHE had sat a minute or two before, fantastically
smiling! Crushed under the huge mass--crushed into the very splinters
of my own empty coffin, she lay--and yet--and yet--I could see nothing,
save one white hand protruding--the hand on which the marriage-ring
glittered mockingly! Even as I looked, that hand quivered
violently--beat the ground--and then--was still! It was horrible. In
dreams I see that quivering white hand now, the jewels on it sparkling
with derisive luster. It appeals, it calls, it threatens, it prays! and
when my time comes to die, it will beckon me to my grave! A portion of
her costly dress was visible--my eyes lighted on this--and I saw a slow
stream of blood oozing thickly from beneath the stone--the ponderous
stone that no man could have moved an inch--the stone that sealed her
awful sepulcher! Great Heaven! how fast the crimson stream of life
trickled!--staining the snowy lace of her garment with a dark and
dreadful hue! Staggering feebly like a drunken man--half delirious with
anguish--I approached and touched that small white hand that lay
stiffly on the ground--I bent my head--I almost kissed it, but some
strange revulsion rose in my soul and forbade the act!

In a stupor of dull agony I sought and found the crucifix of the monk
Cipriano that had fallen to the floor--I closed the yet warm
finger-tips around it and left it thus; an unnatural, terrible calmness
froze the excitement of