He now
exclaimed, at the highest tones of his cracked and feeble voice--
"It is mine--it is mine!--he gave it to me for a consideration--I will
die ere I part with my property!"
"It is indeed his own, mistress," said Nigel, "and I do entreat you to
restore it to the person on whom I have bestowed it, and let me have
my apartment in quiet."
"I will account with you for it, then,"--said the maiden, reluctantly
giving to her father the morsel of Mammon, on which he darted as if
his bony fingers had been the talons of a hawk seizing its prey; and
then making a contented muttering and mumbling, like an old dog after
he has been fed, and just when he is wheeling himself thrice round for
the purpose of lying down, he followed his daughter behind the
tapestry, through a little sliding-door, which was perceived when the
hangings were drawn apart.
"This shall be properly fastened to-morrow," said the daughter to
Nigel, speaking in such a tone that her father, deaf, and engrossed by
his acquisition, could not hear her; "to-night I will continue to
watch him closely.--I wish you good repose."
These few words, pronounced in a tone of more civility than she had
yet made use of towards her lodger, contained a wish which was not to
be accomplished, although her guest, presently after her departure,
retired to bed.
There was a slight fever in Nigel's blood, occasioned by the various
events of the evening, which put him, as the phrase is, beside his
rest.
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