e
had just left--my mind was looking at the room beyond it, the room they
were in.

The waiter was still standing by my side, watching me intently. He
suddenly started back; and, with pale face and staring eyes, pointed
down the stairs.

"You go," he whispered, "go directly! You're well now--I'm afraid to
have you here any longer. I saw your look, your horrid look at that
room! You've heard what you wanted for your money--go at once; or, if
I lose my place for it, I'll call out Murder, and raise the house. And
mind this: as true as God's in heaven, I'll warn them both before they
go outside our door!"

Hearing, but not heeding him, I left the house. No voice that ever
spoke, could have called me back from the course on which I was now
bound. The waiter watched me vigilantly from the door, as I went out.
Seeing this, I made a circuit, before I returned to the spot where, as I
had suspected, the cab they had ridden in was still waiting for them.

The driver was asleep inside. I awoke him; told him I had been sent
to say that he was not wanted again that night: and secured his ready
departure, by at once paying him on his own terms. He drove off; and
the first obstacle on the fatal path which I had resolved to tread
unopposed, was now removed.

As the cab disappeared from my sight, I looked up at the sky. It was
growing very dark. The ragged black clouds, fantastically parted from
each other in island shapes over the whole surface of the heavens, were
fast drawing together into one huge, formless, lowering mass, and
had already hidden the moon for, good. I went back to the street, and
stationed myself in the pitch darkness of a passage which led down a
mews, situated exactly opposite to the hotel.

In the silence and obscurity, in the sudden pause of action while I
now waited and watched, my Thought rose to my lips, and my speech
mechanically formed it into words. I whispered softly to myself: _I will
kill him when he comes out._ My mind never swerved for an instant from
this thought--never swerved towards myself; never swerved towards _her._
Grief was numbed at my heart; and the consciousness of my own misery was
numbed with grief. Death chills all before it--and Death and my Thought
were one.

Once, while I stood on the watch, a sharp agony of suspense tried me
fiercely.

Just as I had calculated that the time was come which would force them
to depart, in order to return to North Villa by the appointed hour, I