s power. Once, for an instant, he fancied
that it yielded to his straining sinews, but it was only his hand that
slided upon the surface of the marble. It was fixed--immovable. The
sides and lid rang with the strokes which the unfortunate lady bestowed
upon them with the dagger's point; but those sounds were not long heard.
Presently all was still; the marble ceased to vibrate with her blows.
Alan struck the lid with his knuckles, but no response was returned. All
was silent.

He now turned his attention to his own situation, which had become
sufficiently alarming. An hour must have elapsed, yet Luke had not
arrived. The door of the vault was closed--the key was in the lock, and
on the outside. He was himself a prisoner within the tomb. What if Luke
should _not_ return? What if he were slain, as it might chance, in the
enterprise? That thought flashed across his brain like an electric
shock. None knew of his retreat but his grandson. He might perish of
famine within this desolate vault.

He checked this notion as soon as it was formed--it was too dreadful to
be indulged in. A thousand circumstances might conspire to detain Luke.
He was sure to come. Yet the solitude--the darkness was awful, almost
intolerable. The dying and the dead were around him. He dared not stir.

Another hour--an age it seemed to him--had passed. Still Luke came not.
Horrible forebodings crossed him; but he would not surrender himself to
them. He rose, and crawled in the direction, as he supposed, of the
door--fearful, even of the stealthy sound of his own footsteps. He
reached it, and his heart once more throbbed with hope. He bent his ear
to the key; he drew in his breath; he listened for some sound, but
nothing was to be heard. A groan would have been almost music in his
ears.

Another hour was gone! He was now a prey to the most frightful
apprehensions, agitated in turns by the wildest emotions of rage and
terror. He at one moment imagined that Luke had abandoned him, and
heaped curses upon his head; at the next, convinced that he had fallen,
he bewailed with equal bitterness his grandson's fate and his own. He
paced the tomb like one distracted; he stamped upon the iron plate; he
smote with his hands upon the door; he shouted, and the vault hollowly
echoed his lamentations. But Time's sand ran on, and Luke arrived not.

Alan now abandoned himself wholly to despair. He could no longer
anticipate his grandson's coming, no longer hope for d