The Amethyst Box

find ourselves met by a dozen wild interrogations from behind as many quickly opened doors. Was it fire? Had burglars got in? What was the matter?

t figure, wrapped in a hastily-donned shawl. The white face loo

ed. "It must have been an awf

ought of an

ed Sinclair, thrusting his ha

elf up with s

she who told me that somebody

greatest relief that ever burst

hat it means," he replied ki

sed, and I could hear the slow and hesitating

Our eyes must be the first to see what

oor he had design

n which Mrs. Lansing slept, was also lighted, but silent as the one in which we stood. This last struck us as the most incomprehensible fact of all. Mrs. Lansing was not the woman to sleep through a disturbance. Where was she, then? and why did we not hear her strident and aggressive tones rising in angry remonstrance at

ither of us, weakened as we were by our forebodings and all the alarms of

into ours, were glassy with reflected light and not with inward intelligence. This glassiness told the tale of the room's grim silence. It was death we looked on; not the death we had anticipated and for which we were in a measure

dy color no one had ever before seen disturbed. And I was still standing there when Mr. Armstrong and all the others came pouring in. Nor have I any distinct remembrance of what was sai

opl

ack my self-possession. But though there were many girlish countenances to be seen in the awestruck groups huddled in e

? Where was she w

t join them. I was rooted to the place. Nor did Sinclair stir a foot, though his eye, which had been wandering restlessly over the faces about him, now settled inquiringly on the doorway. For whom was he looking? Gi

door-post, with her eyes fixed on the room within. Sinclair, advancing, held out his arm. She gave no sign of see

o-morrow," fell from her li

live in some far-off chamber? Or was another and more dreadful tragedy awaiting us? I wondered that I could not join the search. I wondered that even Gilbertine's presence could keep Sinclair from doing so. Didn't he know what, in all proba

ore her; instinctively we followed her with our eyes as, reeling a little at the door, she cast a look of inconceivable shrinking, first at her own bed, then at the group of older people watching her w

eness of any display of grief on her part, which caused the silence with which we saw her pass with forced step and dread anticipation into th

n my mind as the one revolting vision of my life? How, then, if this young and tender-hearted girl had been insensible to it! As her form struck the floor Mr. Armstrong rushed forward; I had not the right. But it was not by his arms she was lifted. Sinclair was before him, and it was with a singularly determined look I could

nal adjuration, as, giving me a l

in his hand. As I approached, he drew me to the window and showed me what it was. It was the amethyst box, open and empty, and

said he. "The box I saw glittering among Dorothy's