"
Colonel Thornton laid down his pen, arose from his seat, and took her
hand and gazed upon her with an expression of blended surprise and
compassion.
"My dear young lady, you are not very well. May I inquire--are your
friends in town, or are you here alone?"
"I am here alone. Nay, I am not mad, Colonel Thornton, although your
looks betray that you think me so."
"No, no, not mad, only indisposed," said the colonel, in no degree
modifying his opinion.
"Colonel Thornton, if there is anything strange and eccentric in my
looks and manner, you must set it down to the strangeness of the
position in which I am placed."
"My dear young lady, Miss Thornton is at the hotel to-day. Will you
permit me to take you to her?"
"You will do as you please, Colonel Thornton, after you shall have heard
my testimony and examined the proofs I have to lay before you. Then I
shall permit you to judge of my soundness of mind as you will,
premising, however, that my sanity or insanity can have no possible
effect upon the proofs that I submit," she said, laying a packet upon
the table between them.
Something in her manner now compelled the magistrate to give her words
an attention for which he blamed himself, as for a gross wrong, toward
his favorite clergyman.
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