e to say, the only thing that
stopped me was the fear of adding to Mrs. Middleton's anguish.
I suppose it was the excessive terror that I felt of being
denounced, or of betraying myself, that saved me from a brain
fever; the very intensity of this anxiety subdued the
extravagance of my despair, and I calmed myself that I might
appear calm. I took some food, because I instinctively felt
that I needed strength and support. It never occurred to me,
it never once crossed my mind, to reveal what I had done. I
felt that if any one accused me, I must have died on the
spot--fled, destroyed myself--I know not what; but at the same
time there was a rigid determination in my soul, that as in
the first moments that had followed Julia's death, I _could_
not, so now I _would_ not, speak. Each hour that elapsed
confirmed this resolution; for every hour that passed by in
silence, every word that was uttered by me, or before me, on
the subject, made the act of self-accusation grow into a
moral impossibility.

When it became dusk the solitude of my room grew intolerable
to me, and I wandered through the house seeking for
companionship, and yet starting off in a different direction,
if the sound of steps or of voices drew near to me. At last I
found my way unobserved into the drawing-room, and sat there,
or paced up and down for a length of time, till at last the
door opened, and my uncle came in.

He walked up to me, laid his hand on my shoulder, and said, in
a voice of subdued emotion "You are now our only child,
Ellen."

I suppose my countenance bore a very wild expression at that
moment, for he looked at me with surprise, and then added in a
still more soothing manner, "Go to your aunt, my dear Ellen;
she will not feel herself childless while you are spared to
us."

A choking sensation rose in my throat, and a cold sweat stood
on my forehead, but I got up, and walked resolutely to my
aunt's room.

She was overwhelmed with grief; her hands were feverish, and
her head burning. I sat down by her, and silently employed
myself in bathing her temples with cold water. She now and
then laid her aching head on my shoulder, and burst into an
agony of crying, which seemed to relieve her.

She asked me where my uncle was; and I could have told her,
for I had heard the servants say, as I was coming up stairs,
that he was returning to the river side, to make one search
more after the body of his child.

The moon was shining brightly,