you done?"

"I have done justly. These notes were false. You desired to destroy
them, that they might not betray the innocent. I applauded your purpose,
and have saved you from the danger of temptation by destroying them
myself."

"Maniac! Miscreant! To be fooled by so gross an artifice! The notes were
genuine. The tale of their forgery was false and meant only to wrest
them from you. Execrable and perverse idiot! Your deed has sealed my
perdition. It has sealed your own. You shall pay for it with your blood.
I will slay you by inches. I will stretch you, as you have stretched me,
on the rack."

During this speech, all was frenzy and storm in the countenance and
features of Welbeck. Nothing less could be expected than that the scene
would terminate in some bloody catastrophe. I bitterly regretted the
facility with which I had been deceived, and the precipitation of my
sacrifice. The act, however lamentable, could not be revoked. What
remained but to encounter or endure its consequences with unshrinking
firmness?

The contest was too unequal. It is possible that the frenzy which
actuated Welbeck might have speedily subsided. It is more likely that
his passions would have been satiated with nothing but my death. This
event was precluded by loud knocks at the street door, and calls by some
one on the pavement without, of--"Who is within? Is any one within?"

These noises gave a new direction to Welbeck's thoughts. "They are
coming," said he. "They will treat you as a sick man and a thief. I
cannot desire you to suffer a worse evil than they will inflict. I leave
you to your fate." So saying, he rushed out of the room.

Though confounded and stunned by this rapid succession of events, I was
yet able to pursue measures for eluding these detested visitants. I
first extinguished the light, and then, observing that the parley in the
street continued and grew louder, I sought an asylum in the remotest
corner of the house. During my former abode here, I noticed that a
trap-door opened in the ceiling of the third story, to which you were
conducted by a movable stair or ladder. I considered that this,
probably, was an opening into a narrow and darksome nook formed by the
angle of the roof. By ascending, drawing after me the ladder, and
closing the door, I should escape the most vigilant search.

Enfeebled as I was by my disease, my resolution rendered me strenuous. I
gained the uppermost room, and, mounting the ladder, foun