When the maid was sufficiently distant to be quite out of hearing, Marston sate down beside Rhoda upon the bench, and took her hand in silence. His grasp was cold, and alternately relaxed and contracted with an agitated uncertainty, while his eyes were fixed upon the ground, and he seemed meditating how to open the conversation. At last, as if suddenly awaking from a fearful reverie, he said—»You correspond with Charles?»
«Yes, sir,» she replied, with the respectful formality prescribed by the usages of the time, «we correspond regularly.»
«Aye, aye; and, pray, when did you last hear from him?» he continued.
«About a month since, sir,» she replied.
«Ha—and—and—was there nothing strange—nothing—nothing mysterious and menacing in his letter? Come, come, you know what I speak of.» He stop
