The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-10-31
OHAPTER xLn
@ge The silence.

< A winters moon shone clearly over the dark fringe of trees ! hich sur rounded the Tidal Pool at Black Hall. Against the clear frosty sky the twigs of the upper branches showed like some delicate tracery sketched out with-in on 8 piece of dark blue paper.
 There was no sound in that forgot ten place save the distant cry of a bird in the marshes and the faint gur- gle of the tide, and nothing moved save the water which had come up from the sea
 Then a faint sound broke the silence of the night The snap of twig, the rustic of bough, the soft footsteps of someone creeping through the trees.
 And then a few moments afterwards something moved at the fringe of the wood which faced the light, and there was the gleam of white face near the foot of the trees. A figure stole quietly into the open. and the black dress of woman stood out clear and distinct against the glittering grass. She looked round hastily, as though afraid that someone might be observ- ing her movements, Then she walked
 .idlv forward to the wall and stared into the eddy of the waters.
 For a few minutes she was as still as one of the statues on the wall it. self. Then she flung herself down on her knees and looked heavenwards at the round disc of the moon. Her elbows were on the parapet. her hands were cIasped together, and her whole atti- tude was that of prayer.
 Her white face was ghastly in the moonlight, and seemed winter than anythinl there save the surface, of the moon it5elf It stood out like aAcameo against the background of trees, as clear-cut pale as the face of q dead woman.
 soh, God" cried Leonore. give me strength. It was here he held me in his arms and asked me to be his wife"
 Nothing moved in the stiffness save the water. Trees. turf, and wall were motionless, and even the figure of Leo- nore might hav,s, s.been carved out of stone, Only the water gurgied through the culvert.
 And then far overhead. there came a faint sound to break the silence, the SistSnt .yelp of hounds Nearer 1t came and nearer. till Leonore thought that some pack was in full cry across the marshland. She looked at the trees, as though she expected to see the dogs leap out from the wood. And then she looked at the blue sky and saw noth- ing. and then at the moon. A few black specks covered the surface, and that was all. She did not understand. She did not know that Gabriel's hounds were in pursuit of a human soul that night.
 The sounds died away into silence and once more she looked into the swirl of the pool. The shivering sur face fascinated her, and she wondered what lay beneath that scintillating sheet of steel. Perhaps there was the secret of happiness in its depths. Per haps the Knowledge of things unseen It looked cold and merciless, yet il could not be colder and more merciless than the world above it.
 Leonore had come to that point in her life when she was able to face the prospect of death without regret and without terror. For time she had eX- isted on the mere excitement of praise and triumph, as a man might he kept alive with stimulants. or drugS. She had applied herself to her art with that furious energy which is the outcome of highly-strung nerves. Nature eXacts full payment for every debt, and the hour of reckoning had come.
 The collapse had taken place one night on the stage itself. in the midst of a big scene which always tried hei physical and mental powers to the ut. most. All England knew that Leonort Jackson would be out of the cast at tht Royal Theatre for many months tC come.
 But Leonore herself and the doctors who had given their verdict, knew more than this.
 ."If you act again" said Sir William Turl. 'I will not be answerable fol your life. You require rest, and yol must always live quiet life, A single big scene may kill you"