A momentary horror swept past me, lest
some one had been watching,--listening, perhaps,--but I did not pause.
I must know how, where, Bernard would hide his misery. It was not quite
dark; I could not run through the night, as I had done before; I must
follow on at a respectable pace, stop to greet the village-people who
were come out in the cool of the evening, and all the while keep in view
that figure, hastening, for what I knew not, but on to the sands, whilst
those whom I met stayed me to ask how Mary Percival died. I passed the
last of the village-houses. There was nothing before me now but Nature
and this unhappy soul. I lost sight of him; I came to the sands; I saw
only long, low flats stretching far out,--beyond them the line of foam.
The moon was not yet gone; but its crescent momently lessened its light.
I went up and down the shore two or three times, going on a little
farther each time, meeting nothing,--nothing but the fear that stood on
the sands before me, whichever way I turned.
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