Here she stopped for a moment, as if about to
speak once more; but her emotions overpowered her. From the sources
which despair and suffering had dried up, the long-prisoned tears once
more flowed forth at the bidding of gratitude and hope. She looked upon
the senator, silent as himself, and her expression at that instant was
destined to remain on his memory while memory survived. Then, with
faltering and hasty steps, she departed by the way she had come; and in
the great palace, which his evil supremacy over the wills of others had
made a hideous charnel-house, he was once more left alone.
He made no effort to follow or detain her as she left him. The torch
still smouldered beside him on the floor, but he never stooped to take
it up; he dropped down on a vacant couch, stupefied by what he had
beheld. That which no entreaties, no threats, no fierce violence of
opposition could have effected in him, the appearance of Antonina had
produced--it had forced him to pause at the very moment of the execution
of his deadly design.
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