Upon her, and only her, fell
the whole burden of this double crime and mystery, ten times more
terrible that her lover was compromised and had disappeared.
"Go to bed, Podge!" said Agnes, as the clock in the engine-house struck
midnight. "Oblige me, my dear! I cannot sleep, and shall wait and watch.
Perhaps Andrew will be here."
"I can't leave you up, Aggy, and with that thing so near." She locked
toward the front parlor, where, behind the folding-doors, lay the dead.
"I have no fear of _that_. He was always kind to me. My fears are all in
this world. O _darling_!"
She burst into sobs. Her friend kissed her again and again, and knew
that feelings between love and crime extorted that last word.
"Aggy," spoke the light-hearted girl, "I know that you cannot help
loving him, and as long as he is loved by you I sha'n't believe him
guilty. Must I really leave you here?"
Her weeping friend turned up her face to give the mandatory kiss, and
Podge was gone.
Agnes sat in solitude, with her hands folded and her heart filled with
unutterable tender woe, that so much causeless cloud had settled upon
the home of her refuge. She could not experience that relief many of us
feel in deep adversity, that it is all illusion, and will in a moment
float away like other dreams.
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