"A little," and she gathered her sables more closely about her and pressed nearer to my side. The capricious moon here suddenly leaped forth like the pale ghost of a frenzied dancer, standing tiptoe on the edge of a precipitous chasm of black clouds. Her rays, pallidly green and cold, fell full on the dreary stretch of land before us, touching up with luminous distinctness those white mysterious milestones of the Campo Santo which mark where the journeys of men, women, and children began and where they left off, but never explain in what new direction they are now traveling. My wife saw and stopped, trembling violently.
"What place is this?" she asked, nervously.
In all her life she had never visited a cemetery--she had too great a horror of death.
"It is where I keep all my treasures," I answered, and my voice sounded strange and harsh in my own ears, while I tightened my grasp of her full, warm waist. "Come with me, my beloved!" and in spite of my efforts, my tone was one of bitter mockery. "With me you need have no fear! Come."
And I led her on, too powerless to resist my force, too startled to speak--on, on, on, over the rank dewy grass and unmarked ancient graves--on, till the low frowning gate of the house of my dead ancestors faced me--on, on, on, with the strength of ten devils in my arm as I held her--on, on, on, to her just doom!