.«
    »Dare not!« repeated the wondering locksmith.
    »Do, not press me,« she replied. »I am sick and faint, and every faculty of
life seems dead within me. - No! - Do not touch me, either.«
    Gabriel, who had stepped forward to render her assistance, fell back as she
made this hasty exclamation, and regarded her in silent wonder.
    »Let me go my way alone,« she said in a low voice, »and let the hands of no
honest man touch mine to-night.« When she had tottered to the door, she turned,
and added with a stronger effort, »This is a secret, which, of necessity, I
trust to you. You are a true man. As you have ever been good and kind to me, -
keep it. If any noise was heard above, make some excuse - say anything but what
you really saw, and never let a word or look between us, recall this
circumstance. I trust to you. Mind, I trust to you. How much I trust, you never
can conceive.«
    Casting her eyes upon him for an instant, she withdrew, and left him there
alone.
    Gabriel, not knowing what to think, stood staring at the door with a
countenance full of surprise and dismay. The more he pondered on what had
passed, the less able he was to give it any favourable interpretation. To find
this widow woman, whose life for so many years had been supposed to be one of
solitude and retirement, and who, in her quiet suffering character, had gained
the good opinion and respect of all who knew her - to find her linked
mysteriously with an ill-omened man, alarmed at his appearance, and yet
favouring his escape, was a discovery that pained as much as startled him. Her
reliance on his secrecy, and his tacit acquiescence, increased his distress of
mind. If he had spoken boldly, persisted in questioning her, detained her when
she rose to leave the room, made any kind of protest, instead of silently
compromising himself, as he felt he had done, he would have been more at ease.
    »Why did I let her say it was a secret, and she trusted it to me!« said
Gabriel, putting his wig on one side to scratch his head with greater ease, and
looking ruefully at the fire. »I have no more readiness than old John himself.
Why didn't I say firmly, You have no right to such secrets, and I
