"But that can not be, Ela, for I heard some one in the room next mine coughing horribly while I was dressing; but the maid denied that any one was in there, and muttered something about the old monk. What could she have meant?" She fancied that Ela shuddered, and her eyes dilated with alarm as she returned: "Good heavens! is that old wretch going to haunt us? Why, Dainty, don't you know about the family ghost of Ellsworth?—the wicked old monk, a relative of the family, who murdered one of the brotherhood, and fled to his old home, hiding himself in a dungeon here till he died of consumption. Well, it is said that he haunts the old wing of Ellsworth, and that whenever his awful, discordant cough is heard it forebodes evil to the hearer. But here is your door. Good-night!"—with a mocking laugh. Dainty had never slept away from her mother's arms before. Lonely and nervous, she slipped into a white dressing-gown, and sat down by the window to watch the full moon sailing above the purple peaks of the mountain range, and listening in a sort of terror for the monk's cough; but the excitement of the day induced speedy sleep. How long she rested there in the moonlight, sleeping heavily, like a weary child tired of playing, she could not tell, only that suddenly she started wide awake in terror, feeling as if a cold, icy hand had pressed her warm bosom, turning her cold as death. [25]Springing to her feet, she found she was not alone, for in the broad glare of the moonlight she saw by her side the tall form of a man gowned in a long black robe girdled with a rosary of beads, while his close-shaven face shone ghastly white under his black skull-cap, and the dull, fixed eyes had the awful stare of death. [25] With a piercing cry, Dainty sprang past the midnight visitant, rushed to the door, and throwing it open, bounded into the corridor, flying with terror-winged feet toward her cousin's room. Then she pounded on the door, shrieking, piteously: "For God's sake, let me in!" The door opened so quickly that Dainty, leaning against it, lost her balance, and fell blindly forward into the arms of the man who had opened it—Lovelace Ellsworth, who had not yet retired, because his heart and mind were so full of her he knew he could not sleep. [26] [26]
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