The Mysteries of the Court of London Vol. 4 — page 181: what you’re looking at

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

Veeueeeemenes” saree ee 188 ad ae “ betray me—or disobey my directions, and you shall be exposed fully and punished mercilessly !” “Depend upon it, Mr. Loftus,” said Maravelli, “1 will serve you in all things :”—and it was now with fear and tremblidtg that he gazed upon our young hero, who scemed like an avenging angel pursuing the thread of heaven’s own inscrutable desicus. . You have told me,” he resumed, fixing his eyes upon Maravelli with a look that showed he was dctérmined to be obeyed in whatever he demanded, —you have told me that you frequently devote your leisure hours to anatomical pursuits, and that Kobolt and his companions supply you with what the faculty dcnominate subjects? In that case, you must have a dissecting-room; and it is there that 1 propose to leave this infant corpse for the present. Now conduct me to ypur dissccting- room, doctor.” e Maravelli took up the lamy—while Loftus, hav- ing secured the tell-tale cambric handkerchief and flannel about his person, enveloped the tiny corpse in the canvass, and with his loathsome bur- then followed the doctor, who led him through the hall to a roum openmy from a dark passage at the end. This place was fitted up with all the grim, hideous machinery and apparatus of a’ dis- secting-room. There was the pulley fixed to the ceiling, with the cord and the hook attached thereto, so as to elevate at will a corpse when stretched upon the slightly inclining plane of the ‘eaden table over which the cordage hung. There yere scalpels, dissecting-knives, saws, trepanning instruments, and various anatomical implements,— pails also, to catch the fluids and the entrails of tue subjects—and mops to cleanse the floor. Ind word, the studio was complete for its ghastly pur- pose; and although there was no corpse at the moment when Maravelli led Jocelyn in, yet was there a faint sickly odour against which the heart heaved. , It seemed as if the clammy nau- seating smell of the dead had settled itself in that place—clinging to the very ceiling and walls like a grave-mist, fetid arfd inexpulsable ! Against the wall stood two upright boxes—tall, narrow, and painted black. One of the doors had by some accident come spen—revealing a bleached skeleton as the ghastly tenant of that wooden | in home! ® THE MYSTERIES OF THE COURT. “ I shall not deceive you id aby way, My. Loftus,” responded Maravelli, as he locked the door of the dissecting-room ard put the key in his pocket. He and Jocelyn then separated, each to retire to his respective chamber; and when our hero was alone, he could not help felicitating himself upon having been enabled, by a fayourable con- catenation of circumstances, to do so much in com- paratively so short a period of time towards the unravelment of the conspiracy against the perse- cuted wife of the Prince Regent. a CHAPTER CLIV. THE THREE SISTERS. Tne day that dawned upon the night of Jocelyn’s adventures, as just recorded, was ushered in by one of those brilliant mornings which render the climate so wholesome, the heavens so cloudless, and the whole face of nature so transcendingly beautiful for the dweller upon the banks of Lake Leman. It was, as the reader is aware, the early part of May at the period of which we are writing, and many of those fruits which in England are not ripened ufitil six weeks later were now gem. ming the borders, or hanging in rich clusters to the trees. Thus strawberries, cherries, goosc- berries, currants, and ali the earlier fruits were mingling their luscious hues with the emerald foliage; and the gardens belonging to the sub- urban villas of Geneva appeared in all the pride of their beauty. c It was about half-past seven o'dlock on this lovely morning, that three beautiful creatures were vatherel ina balcony at the open casement of a bed-chamber overlooking the garden of the Prin- cess’s villa. These were Agatha, Emma, and Julia Owen. Agatha, the eldest, appeared the Jeast thing pale and delicate. Indeed, but three wecks had elapsed since she became a mother under the circumstances already described; and with an amazing fortitude and a surprising amount of physical energy, had she performed all her duties as herctofore,—cver ntfendance upon the Princess, always one of the first down at the breakfast-table, and scrupulously “These are the bones of a murderer, who was ! rerular in observing the routine of the houschold. guillotined about seven years Ago in the market- | Thus was it utterly impossible to suspect that she place,” suid the physician, pointing to the object | had so recently passed through that ordeal which just named. “The other box contains the skeleton ‘sis so terrible even for the woman who is surrounded of his wife, who suffered death with him and for the same cause. I obtained possession of their corpses after their execution, and have preserved their bones thus. Where the vertebrae of the neck were severed by the axe of the guillotine, 1 have fastened tue bones with wire.” But Loftus did not pay any particular attention to these anatomies, which were in reality the ob- jects of the physician’s special admiration; and having deposited ithe corpse of the child upon the leaden table, he turned away from the dis- secting-room. “7 shall not insult you by demanding the key of that place,” he said to Maravelli, as they again stood together in the hall: “but I charge you not tu let those remains disappear from the table where I have left them.” 4 by all comforts fitted for the occasion, and who, by having no shame to conceal, may retain her couch until nature restores herself again But it was not withouta painful effort that Agatha had thus defied as it were the ordinary course of nature ; and there had beex moments when though the smile was upon her lip, agony was in all her limbs, and though her spirits seemed elevated as ifinspired by thrilling music, her frame was in reality drooping as ‘| she must sink down through mere exhaustion. Indeed, had it not been for certain excellent restoratives and sovereign cordials which Mrs. Ranger had ad- ministered, Agatha never could have sustained her part in such aemanner: but even though she suc- ceeded in doing so, it was at some little sacrifice of heft health—and the wonder with her sisters and Mrs. Ranger was, rot that she: looked somewhat O) ECOMNIE OG cS) CO