“Dreadful—­horrible—­oh, God!  God!—­My God!  How frightful!”

And throwing himself into a chair, he clasped his hands across his eyes and forehead, while the sweat of agony literally poured down his pale face.

“Truly it is so,” said the clergyman, scarcely above his breath; and, after a long interval—­“horrible indeed!”

“Well,” said Marston, rising suddenly to his feet, wiping the dews of horror from his face, and looking wildly round, like one newly awoke from a nightmare, “I must make the most of this momentous and startling disclosure.  I shall spare no pains to come at the truth,” said he, energetically.  “Meanwhile, my dear sir, for the sake of justice and of mercy, observe secrecy.  Leave me to sift this matter; give no note anywhere that we suspect.  Observe this reserve and security, and with it detection will follow.  Breathe but one word, and you arm the guilty with double caution, and turn licentious gossip loose upon the fame of an innocent and troubled family.  Once more I entreat—­I expect—­I implore silence—­silence, at least, for the present—­silence!”

“I quite agree with you, my dear Mr. Marston,” answered Dr. Danvers.  “I have not divulged one syllable of that poor wretch’s confession, save to yourself alone.  You, as a magistrate, a relative of the murdered gentleman, and the head of that establishment among whom the guilt rests, are invested with an interest in detecting, and powers of sifting the truth in this matter, such as none other possesses.  I clearly see, with you, too, the inexpediency and folly of talking, for talking’s sake, of this affair.  I mean to keep my counsel, and shall most assuredly, irrespectively even of your request—­which should, however, of course, have weight with me—­maintain a strict and cautious silence upon this subject.”

Some little time longer they remained together, and Marston, buried in strange thoughts, took his leave, and rode slowly back to Gray Forest.

Months passed away—­a year, and more—­and though no new character appeared upon the stage, the relations which had subsisted among the old ones became, in some respects, very materially altered.  A gradual and disagreeable change came over Mademoiselle de Barras’s manner; her affectionate attentions to Mrs. Marston became less and less frequent; nor was the change merely confined to this growing coldness; there was something of a positive and still more unpleasant kind in the alteration we have noted.  There was a certain independence and carelessness, conveyed in a hundred intangible but significant little incidents and looks—­a something which, without being open to formal rebuke or remonstrance, yet bordered, in effect, upon impertinence, and even insolence.  This indescribable and provoking self-assertion, implied in glances, tones, emphasis, and general bearing, surprised Mrs. Marston far more than it irritated her.  As often as she experienced one of these studied slights or insinuated impertinences, she revolved in her own mind all the incidents of their past intercourse, in the vain endeavor to recollect some one among them which could possibly account for the offensive change so manifest in the conduct of the young Frenchwoman.