n the key
turned in the lock, to consign her to a night of suspence, she felt a
degree of anguish which the circumstances scarcely justified.

Continually on the watch, the shutting of a door, or the sound of a
foot-step, made her start and tremble with apprehension, something like
what she felt, when, at her entrance, dragged along the gallery, she
began to doubt whether she were not surrounded by demons?

Fatigued by an endless rotation of thought and wild alarms, she looked
like a spectre, when Jemima entered in the morning; especially as her
eyes darted out of her head, to read in Jemima's countenance, almost
as pallid, the intelligence she dared not trust her tongue to demand.
Jemima put down the tea-things, and appeared very busy in arranging the
table. Maria took up a cup with trembling hand, then forcibly recovering
her fortitude, and restraining the convulsive movement which agitated
the muscles of her mouth, she said, "Spare yourself the pain of
preparing me for your information, I adjure you!--My child is dead!"
Jemima solemnly answered, "Yes;" with a look expressive of compassion
and angry emotions. "Leave me," added Maria, making a fresh effort to
govern her feelings, and hiding her face in her handkerchief, to conceal
her anguish--"It is enough--I know that my babe is no more--I will hear
the particulars when I am"--calmer, she could not utter; and Jemima,
without importuning her by idle attempts to console her, left the room.

Plunged in the deepest melancholy, she would not admit Darnford's
visits; and such is the force of early associations even on strong
minds, that, for a while, she indulged the superstitious notion that she
was justly punished by the death of her child, for having for an instant
ceased to regret her loss. Two or three letters from Darnford, full
of soothing, manly tenderness, only added poignancy to these accusing
emotions; yet the passionate style in which he expressed, what he termed
the first and fondest wish of his heart, "that his affection might make
her some amends for the cruelty and injustice she had endured," inspired
a sentiment of gratitude to heaven; and her eyes filled with delicious
tears, when, at the conclusion of his letter, wishing to supply the
place of her unworthy relations, whose want of principle he execrated,
he assured her, calling her his dearest girl, "that it should henceforth
be the business of his life to make her happy."

He begged, in a note sent t