"Oh, no, no, no!" she moaned, wildly, "not Fabio!--no, it cannot be=-Fabio is dead--dead! And you!--you are mad!--this is some cruel jest of yours--some trick to frighten me!"
She broke off breathlessly, and her large, terrified eyes wandered to mine again with a reluctant and awful wonder. She attempted to arise from her crouching position; I approached, and assisted her to do so with ceremonious politeness. She trembled violently at my touch, and slowly staggering to her feet, she pushed back her hair from her forehead and regarded me fixedly with a searching, anguished look, first of doubt, then of dread, and lastly of convinced and hopeless certainty, for she suddenly covered her eyes with her hands as though to shut out some repulsive object and broke into a low wailing sound like that of one in bitter physical pain. I laughed scornfully.
"Well, do you know me at last?" I cried. "'Tis true I have somewhat altered. This hair of mine was black, if you remember--it is white enough now, blanched by the horrors of a living death such as you cannot imagine, but which," and I spoke more slowly and impressively, "you may possibly experience ere long. Yet in spite of this change I think you know me! That is well. I am glad your memory serves you thus far!"
A low sound that was half a sob and half a cry broke from her.
"Oh, no, no!" she muttered, again, incoherently--"it cannot be! It must be false--it is some vile plot--it cannot be true! True! Oh, Heaven! it would be too cruel, too horrible!"
I strode up to her. I drew her hands away from her eyes and grasped them tightly in my own.
"Hear me!" I said, in clear, decisive tones. "I have kept silence, God knows, with a long patience, but now--now I can speak. Yes! you thought me dead--you had every reason to think so, you had every proof to believe so. How happy my supposed death made you! What a relief it was to you!--what an obstruction removed from your path! But--I was buried alive!" She uttered a faint shriek of terror, and looking wildly about her, strove to wrench her hands from my clasp. I held them more closely. "Ay, think of it, wife of mine!--you to whom luxury has been second nature, think of this poor body straightened in a helpless swoon, packed and pressed into yonder coffin and nailed up fast, shut out from the blessed light and air, as one would have thought, forever! Who could have dreamed that life still lingered in me--life still strong enough to split asunder the boards that inclosed me, and leave them shattered, as you see them now!"