 and we heard her enter the library.
    A comparative silence ensued. Lady Ingrain thought it le cas to wring her
hands: which she did accordingly. Miss Mary declared she felt, for her part, she
never dared venture. Amy and Louisa Eshton tittered under their breath, and
looked a little frightened.
    The minutes passed very slowly: fifteen were counted before the library-door
again opened. Miss Ingram returned to us through the arch.
    Would she laugh? Would she take it as a joke? All eyes met her with a glance
of eager curiosity, and she met all eyes with one of rebuff and coldness: she
looked neither flurried nor merry; she walked stiffly to her seat, and took it
in silence.
    »Well, Blanche?« said Lord Ingram.
    »What did she say, sister?« asked Mary.
    »What do you think? How do you feel? Is she a real fortune-teller?« demanded
the Misses Eshton.
    »Now, now, good people,« returned Miss Ingram, »don't press upon me. Really
your organs of wonder and credulity are easily excited: you seem by the
importance you all - my good mama included - ascribe to this matter - absolutely
to believe we have a genuine witch in the house, who is in close alliance with
the old gentleman. I have seen a gipsy-vagabond; she has practised in hackneyed
fashion the science of palmistry, and told me what such people usually tell. My
whim is gratified; and now I think Mr. Eshton will do well to put the hag in the
stocks to-morrow morning, as he threatened.«
    Miss Ingram took a book, leant back in her chair, and so declined further
conversation. I watched her for nearly half an hour: during all that time she
never turned a page, and her face grew momently darker, more dissatisfied, and
more sourly expressive of disappointment. She had obviously not heard anything
to her advantage: and it seemed to me, from her prolonged fit of gloom and
taciturnity, that she herself, notwithstanding her professed indifference,
attached undue importance to whatever revelations had been made her.
    Meantime, Mary Ingram, Amy and Louisa Eshton, declared they dared not go
alone; and yet they all wished to go. A negotiation was opened through the
medium of the ambassador, Sam; and after much pacing to and fro, till, I think,
the said Sam's calves must have ached with the exercise, permission was at last,
with great difficulty, extorted from the rigorous Sybil, for the three
