'The darkness is at hand!' she
continued; 'the night will be thick and black in the dim halls of the
temple; I shall see her when she shall not see me!--the darkness is
coming; the vengeance is sure!'
She closed her lips, and with fatal perseverance continued to watch and
wait, as she had resolutely watched and waited already. The Roman and
the Goth; the opposite in sex, nation, and fate; the madman who dreamed
of the sanguinary superstitions of Paganism before the temple altar, and
the assassin who brooded over the chances of bloodshed beneath the
temple portico, were now united in a mysterious identity of expectation,
uncommunicated and unsuspected by either--the hour when the sun vanished
from the heaven was the hour of the sacrifice for both!
****
There is now a momentary pause in the progress of events. Occurrences
to be hereafter related render it necessary to take advantage of this
interval to inform the reader of the real nature and use of the vault in
the temple wall, the external appearance of which we have already
described.
Pages:
724
725
726
727
728
729
730
731
732
733
734
735
736
737
738
739
740
741
742
743
744
745
746
747
748