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expression of much curiosity. Yet his very indifference, had not my fate otherwise ordained, should have alarmed my watchfulness, so utterly different did it appear from the emotion which he usually expressed when called upon to listen to a narrative so sorrowful and touching. But he heard it, as if in a dream. His mind seemed wandering, and I was lulled into the most complete security. Never was indifference so well enacted—never had mortal been more attentive to a history than Harding to this. All its details had been carefully treasured up, and where the old lady had associated me with the adventures of her daughter, his mind had taken deep note, and the record in his memory was ineradicably written. Over the chimney place stood a rude portrait of the murdered girl, to which, when the old lady called for his attention to her beautiful features, he scarcely gave a glance; and he, whom destiny had selected to bring the murderer of her child to punishment, provoked openly the anger of the mother, by his glaring inattention to the story of her supposed fate. We left the cottage after a somewhat protracted visit. I had no single concern—not the slightest apprehension, so completely had my companion played his part in the transaction— but he had not lost a word, not a look not an action, in all the events of that morning. His eye was forever upon me—his thoughts were dissecting mine, and the most distant association of cause and effect, drawn vividly together by his intellect, quickened into sleepless exercise and energy by the influences acting upon it, supplied him with the materials for commencing the true history of my crime. We passed the rock on our return. I could not keep my eyes from it; and his eyes were on mine. He saw the same ashy paleness of my cheek and look, and he saw that this rock had something to do with my history. In the analysis of a story like mine—so terribly romantic as it was—his imagination became a prime auxiliar, and with its aid, where a dull man would have paused for facts, with the felicity of truth, it supplied them. He grew strong and confident in each hour of his progress in this labor. CHAPTER XVI. We had in our village, among its other wonders, a small building, which, by a stretch of liberal indulgence, had been denominated “the Academy of Fine Arts.” It was almost our only lion, and we made the most of it. Its collection was poor enough and large enough, and CHAPTER XV 49 Simms-MFaber final pages:Layout 1 4/10/08 11:50 AM Page 49 always on the increase, from the habit prevailing among a few of our domestic artists of sending their pictures to the gallery, as frequently for sale as exhibition. This kept the collection always new; and consequently , to a certain extent, always interesting. It was a favourite lounge for this and for other reasons. In connexion with the establishment, an adjoining apartment had been given up to the village library, and there we got our books, and read newspapers from all parts of the country. As we had our politicians too, so we had our discussions; and thus, in a country like ours, where disputation is the mental small-beer of all classes, we had an additional attraction for the crowd, in the eloquence of our disputants. From the picture-gallery we adjourned to the library, from the library to the reading-room, and the transition was not great from the perusal of the journal to the forensic analysis of its contents. This apartment was a complete bear-garden—but our business is not there at this moment. A week had not well elapsed after the ramble of Harding and myself, narrated in the previous chapter, when, lounging with my wife through the gallery aforesaid, I beheld one picture, crowded among the hundred upon its walls, from which I could not turn my eyes. It filled me with astonishment while awakening in my mind a thousand apprehensions— more painful, as they were vague and intangible. It depicted the scene of my crime—the crime itself—as truly done to nature (so my fancy assured me) as if the artist himself had surveyed its execution. There was the little copse upon the neck of land, the stream running alongside in faithful affinity—there lay the female form, pale...

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