'
Lady Maulevrier uttered no word of sorrow or surprise. She lay, looking
straight before her into vacancy, the pale attenuated features rigid as
if they had been marble. What was to be done--what must be told--whom
could she trust? Those were the questions repeating themselves in her
mind as she stared into space. And no answer came to them.
No answer came, except the opening of the door opposite her couch. The
handle turned slowly, hesitatingly, as if moved by feeble fingers; and
then the door was pushed slowly open, and an old man came with shuffling
footsteps towards the one lighted spot in the middle of the room.
It was the old man Lord Hartfield had last seen gloating over his
treasury of gold and jewels--the man whom Maulevrier had never
seen--whose existence for forty years had been hidden from every
creature in that house, except Lady Maulevrier and the Steadmans, until
Mary found her way into the old garden.
He came close up to the little table in front of Lady Maulevrier's
couch, and looked down at her, a strange, uncanny being, withered and
bent, with pale, faded eyes in which there was a glimmer of unholy
light.
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