Great Heart and Little Heart

THERE was a pause.

The moments passed--and not one of the three moved. The moments
passed--and not one of the three spoke. Insensibly the words of
supplication died away on Julian's lips. Even his energy failed to
sustain him, tried as it now was by the crushing oppression of suspense.
The first trifling movement which suggested the idea of change, and
which so brought with it the first vague sense of relief, came from
Mercy. Incapable of sustaining the prolonged effort of standing, she
drew back a little and took a chair. No outward manifestation of emotion
escaped her. There she sat--with the death-like torpor of resignation in
her face--waiting her sentence in silence from the man at whom she had
hurled the whole terrible confession of the truth in one sentence!

Julian lifted his head as she moved. He looked at Horace, and advancing
a few steps, looked again. There was fear in his face, as he suddenly
turned it toward Mercy.

"Speak to him!" he said, in a whisper. "Rouse him, before it's too
late!"

She moved mechanically in her chair; she looked mechanically at Julian.

"What more have I to say to him?" she asked, in faint, weary tones. "Did
I not tell him everything when I told him my name?"

The natural sound of her voice might have failed to affect Horace. The
altered sound of it roused him. He approached Mercy's chair, with a dull
surprise in his face, and put his hand, in a weak, wavering way, on her
shoulder. In that position he stood for a while, looking down at her in
silence.