but Juliet stopt him, to demand whence he came, and who sent him.

A lady, he answered, who spoke broken English, and who had named five of the clock in the morning.

'Oh yes! Oh yes!' cried Juliet: 'I will not fail!' whilst a soft murmur finished with 'Tis herself!—'tis my Gabriella!

What brought her back to Brighthelmstone, now occupied all the thoughts of her friend. Was it a design to fix her abode where her maternal enthusiasm might daily be cherished by visiting the grave of her child? Or, was it for the single indulgence of bathing that melancholy spot once more with her tears?

It was already night, or Juliet would have sought to anticipate the meeting, by some enquiry at their former lodgings: the morning, however, soon arrived, and, nearly with its dawn, she arose, and, by a previous arrangement made with the gardener, quitted the house, to hasten to the church-yard upon the hill.

In her way thither, she was seized, from time to time, with something like an apprehension that she was pursued; for, though no one came in sight, the stillness of the early morning enabled her to hear, distinctly, a footstep that now seemed to follow her own, now to stop till she had proceeded some yards.

It might merely be some workman;—yet would not a workman overtake her, and pass on? It was more probably some traveller. Nevertheless, she would not ascend the hill without making some examination; and, casting a hasty glance behind her, she perceived a[Pg 551] tall man, muffled up, whose air denoted him to be a gentleman; but who instantly hung back.

[Pg 551]

A thousand anxious doubts were now awakened. Was it possible that she had been summoned upon any false pretence? Gabriella had not written; and though that omission had, at first, appeared the natural result of haste upon her arrival; joined to the difficulty of immediately procuring writing implements, it left an opening to uncertainty upon reflection, by no means satisfactory. That she should not personally have presented herself at the house of Mrs Ireton, could excite no surprize, for she well knew that Juliet had neither time nor a room at her own command; and to re-visit the grave of her child had always been the purpose of Gabriella.

With a slackened and irresolute step, she now went on, till, wistfully looking towards the church-yard, she descried a female, with 

 Prev. P 12/135 next