第52章

IN THE DUNGEON.

The interim between Miranda setting down her lamp on the dungeon floor among the rats and the beetles, and the dwarf's finding her bleeding and senseless, was not more than twenty minutes, but a great deal may be done in twenty minutes judiciously expended, and most decidedly it was so in the present case.Both rats and beetles paused to contemplate the flickering lamp, and Miranda paused to contemplate them, and Sir Norman paused to contemplate her, for an instant or so in silence.Her marvelous resemblance to Leoline, in all but one thing, struck him more and more -there was the same beautiful transparent colorless complexion, the same light, straight, graceful figure, the same small oval delicate features; the same profuse waves of shining dark hair, the same large, dark, brilliant eyes; the same, little, rosy pretty mouth, like one of Correggio's smiling angels.The one thing wanting was expression - in Leoline's face there was a kind of childlike simplicity; a look half shy, half fearless, half solemn in her wonderful eyes; but in this, her prototype, there was nothing shy or solemn; all was cold, hard, and glittering, and the brooding eyes were full of a dull, dusky fire.She looked as hard and cold and bitter, as she was beautiful; and Sir Norman began to perplex himself inwardly as to what had brought her here.Surely not sympathy, for nothing wearing that face of stone, could even know the meaning of such a word.While he looked at her, half wonderingly, half pityingly, half tenderly -a queer word that last, but the feeling was caused by her resemblance to Leoline - she had been moodily watching an old gray rat, the patriarch of his tribe, who was making toward her in short runs, stopping between each one to stare at her, out of his unpleasantly bright eyes.Suddenly, Miranda shut her teeth, clenched her hands, and with a sort of fierce suppressed ejaculation, lifted her shining foot and planted it full on the rat's head.So sudden, so fierce, and so strong, was the stamp, that the rat was crushed flat, and uttered a sharp and indignant squeal of expostulation, while Sir Norman looked at her, thinking she had lost her wits.Still she ground it down with a fiercer and stronger force every second; and with her eyes still fixed upon it, and blazing with reddish black flame, she said, in a sort of fiery hiss:

"Look at it! The ugly, loathsome thing! Did you ever see anything look more like him?"There must have been some mysterious rapport between them, for he understood at once to whom the solitary personal pronoun referred.

"Certainly, in the general expression of countenance there is rather a marked resemblance, especially in the region of the teeth and eyes.""Except that the rat's eyes are a thousand times handsomer," she broke in, with a derisive laugh.

"But as to shape," resumed Sir Norman, eyeing the excited and astonished little animal, still shrilly squealing, with the glance of a connoisseur,"I confess I do not see it! The rat is straight and shapely - which his highness, with all reverence be it said - is not, but rather the reverse, if you will not be offended at me for saying so."She broke into a short laugh that had a hard, metallic ring, and then her face darkened, blackened, and she ground the foot that crushed the rat fiercer, and with a sort of passionate vindictiveness, as if she had the head of the dwarf under her heel.

"I hate him! I hate him!" she said, through her clenched teeth and though her tone was scarcely above a whisper, it was so terrible in its fiery earnestness thatSir Norman thrilled with repulsion."Yes, I hate him with all my heart and soul, and I wish to heaven I had him here, like this rat, to trample to death under my feet!"Not knowing very well what reply to make to this strong and heartfelt speech, which rather shocked his notions of female propriety, Sir Norman stood silent, and looked reflectively after the rat, which, when she permitted it at last to go free, limped away with an ineffably sneaking and crest-fallen expression on his hitherto animated features.She watched it, too, with a gloomy eye, and when it crawled into the darkness and was gone, she looked up with a face so dark and moody that it was almost sullen.

"Yes, I hate him!" she repeated, with a fierce moodiness that was quite dreadful, " yes, I hate him! and I would kill him, like that rat, if I could! He has been the curse of my whole life; he has made life cursed to me; and his heart's blood shall be shed for it some day yet, I swear!"With all her beauty there was something so horrible in the look she wore, that Sir Norman involuntarily recoiled from her.Her sharp eyes noticed it, and both grew red and fiery as two devouring flames.

"Ah! you, too, shrink from me, would you? You, too, recoil in horror! Ingrate! And I have come to save your life!""Madame, I recoil not from you, but from that which is tempting you to utter words like these.I have no reason to love him of whom you speak - you, perhaps, have even less; but I would not have his blood, shed in murder, on my head, for ten thousand worlds! Pardon me, but you do not mean what you say.""Do I not? That remains to be seen! I would not call it murder plunging a knife into the heart of a demon incarnate like that, and I would have done it long ago and he knows it, too, if I had the chance!""What has he done to you to make you do bitter against him?""Bitter! Oh, that word is poor and pitiful to express what Ifeel when his name is mentioned.Loathing and hatred come a little nearer the mark, but even they are weak to express the utter - the - " She stopped in a sort of white passion that choked her very words.

"They told me he was your husband," insinuated Sir Norman, unutterably repelled.