She obeyed as might an automaton. Was it the tone of his voice that chilled her, or the studied aspect of his fixed and solemn countenance? He did not speak at once, but when he did, there was no faltering in his voice, that was lower than common, but deep, like still waters that have run into dark channels far from the light of day.
“Paula, I want to ask you a question. What would you think of a man that, with deliberate selfishness, went into the king’s garden, and plucking up by the roots the most beautiful flower he could find there, carried it into a dungeon to pant out its exquisite life amid chill and darkness?”
“I should think,” replied she, after the first startled moment of silence, “that the man did well, if by its one breath of sweetness, the flower could comfort the heart of him who sat in the dungeon.”
The glance with which Mr. Sylvester regarded her, suddenly faltered; he turned with quickness towards the fire. “A moment’s joy is, then, excuse for a murder,” exclaimed he. “God and the angels would not agree with you, Paula.”
There was a quivering in his tone, made all the more apparent by its studied self-possession of a moment before. She trembled where she sat, and opened her lips to speak, but closed them again, awed by his steady and abstracted gaze, now fixed before him in gloomy reverie. A moment passed. The clock ticking away on the mantelpiece seemed to echo the inevitable “Forever! never!” of Longfellow’s old song. Neither of them moved. At length, in a low and trembling voice, Paula spoke:
“Is it murder, when the flower loves the dark of the dungeon more than it does the light of day?”
With a subdued but passionate cry he rose hastily to his feet. “Yes,” said he, and drew back as if he could not bear the sight of her face or the