gs. It did not vibrate on the chords of
unhappy memory, but was soothing to the heart as the voice of Pity. She
continued to muse, unconscious of the gloom of evening, and that the
sun's last light trembled on the heights above, and would probably have
remained so much longer, if a sudden footstep, without the building,
had not alarmed her attention, and first made her recollect that she was
unprotected. In the next moment, a door opened, and a stranger appeared,
who stopped on perceiving Emily, and then began to apologize for his
intrusion. But Emily, at the sound of his voice, lost her fear in a
stronger emotion: its tones were familiar to her ear, and, though she
could not readily distinguish through the dusk the features of the
person who spoke, she felt a remembrance too strong to be distrusted.

He repeated his apology, and Emily then said something in reply, when
the stranger eagerly advancing, exclaimed, 'Good God! can it be--surely
I am not mistaken--ma'amselle St. Aubert?--is it not?'

'It is indeed,' said Emily, who was confirmed in her first conjecture,
for she now distinguished the countenance of Valancourt, lighted up with
still more than its usual animation. A thousand painful recollections
crowded to her mind, and the effort, which she made to support herself,
only served to increase her agitation. Valancourt, meanwhile, having
enquired anxiously after her health, and expressed his hopes, that M.
St. Aubert had found benefit from travelling, learned from the flood of
tears, which she could no longer repress, the fatal truth. He led her
to a seat, and sat down by her, while Emily continued to weep, and
Valancourt to hold the hand, which she was unconscious he had taken,
till it was wet with the tears, which grief for St. Aubert and sympathy
for herself had called forth.

'I feel,' said he at length, 'I feel how insufficient all attempt at
consolation must be on this subject. I can only mourn with you, for I
cannot doubt the source of your tears. Would to God I were mistaken!'

Emily could still answer only by tears, till she rose, and begged they
might leave the melancholy spot, when Valancourt, though he saw her
feebleness, could not offer to detain her, but took her arm within his,
and led her from the fishing-house. They walked silently through the
woods, Valancourt anxious to know, yet fearing to ask any particulars
concerning St. Aubert; and Emily too much distressed to converse.
After some time,