Danger in the Dark - ZseZse

66 DANGER IN THE DA,RK.
With trembling hand and palpitating heart Maria
took the letter. The Abbess, turning away, left her
to peruse it alone.
Not many minutes after the unhappy girl had
received the offensive missive, Dupin entered her
apartment and found her convulsively weeping.
"What now, dear child ~" inquired he most tenderly,
putting on, as far as a villain can, a look and
tone of innocence, "tell me the cause, loved one, of
these sobs and tears."
When able sufficiently to compose herself, she said
with a faltering voice: " Alas! my unkindness and
neglect have changed a heart once pure and loving, to
malignity and baseness I Alonzo has become a fiend,
and it was I that made him such I"
" Reproach not yourself, my angel- that Carleton
is a vile heretic - and mark my words, he will yet
teach you to despise him. Is that letter from him i"
"His name signs it, and she who brought it to me
said Alonzo Carleton gave it to her.
"Let me see what the wretch has dar
you;" saying which, he picked up the letter, which
had fallen from Maria's trembling hand to the
floor; tracing the lines with an expression of indigna-
'ion, he exclaimed: "base! base I" then dashing it
down, stamped upon it with his foot, saying, "I hope
now, my child, you'll banish forever, all recollections
of that depraved young man from your pure mind; he
is not worthy of your love, nor of a moment's thonght;