Beautiful Rienzi; or, The Secret Vendetta — page 107: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

100 BEAUTIFUL RIENZI. and shutting of doors, with the most wanton disregard for the sick girl, for whom quiet waslife. Atlast they ceased, and the house was quiet again, and more than an hour passed away. ‘Then Sophie came slipping in with her master’s key and locked the door behind her, and without coming to look at the invalid, busied herself in the dressing-room arrang- ing the furniture. ‘‘ Sophie,” I whispered, ‘‘ come and see if you notice any change.” «< Yes, Miss Iva,” said the girl, hurriedly. But still she staid, and when I rose and looked through the door-way,I saw her folding up some dresses and weeping violently though without sound. ‘‘What is the matter, my girl?” I exclaimed. ‘Oh, don’t—don’t say nothing, miss!” she gasped; ‘if I was to say one word, I’d scream out and kill that poor saint.” : “‘Tgs my father all right, Sophie?” “*Oh, yes, Miss Iva, dear, and he’s up this hour, and breakfast will soon be ready, and then I’m to take your lace.” i It was nine o’clock when I unlocked the door to go down stairs. I closed it again with a start, and turned to Sophie, my face whitening with a disagreeable shock which I had ot. «« There is a strange man standing at the door,” I whis- ered. cap Hush!—oh, Miss Ivanilla, don’t!” returned the girl, wringing her hands; ‘‘ don’t ask me a word—I can’t speak of it; and if she heard you she’d die. Oh, Miss Iva dar- oe, run down to your father—run straight down to im !”’ I braced my nerves and reopened the door, leaving Sophie to lock it on the inside. With downcast eyes I passed a tall, muscular man, clad in a dark-blue coat, who gazed keenly and silently at me. I went step by step down stairs, and, to my intense amazement, found two other men sit- ting on chairs on each side of the entrance door, who leered and nodded their heads at me. I passed them with an af- frighted rush and gained the dining room, where my father was standing on the hearth-rug. “Father, who are these men in the passage and at my sister’s door? What does it mean?” I cried, | Gomicbooks: co