Beadle's Dime Novels No. 20: Florida; or, The Iron Will — page 111: what you’re looking at

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

weak in bondage could by any possibility be true. As the hours wore on, her fortitude went with them. If Florida woul4 only go out—if she herself -had the courage to go out and search the hospitals—oh ! to find some clue to poor Parker! If they were friends who had disposed of him, why did they not leave their names and tell what they intended to do? If enemies, what had become of him? She shuddered as her imagination led her to dark places—to the river with its silent bed beneath—to the great grave of a dissecting room—her brain grew dizzy with dread. | Florida drove to the hospitals—there were three within a :rouit of six miles—but she received no information at either. They had taken no one of that name. Then, when several weeks had passed, she determined to profit by the suggestion of Le Roy, and put Virginia to sleep. | A wet, uncomfortable evening without doors excluded all callers. It ws now fast verging into November. The weather had been unusually mild until to-day, and Florida, full of her project, had gone about thoughtfully. Now she seated herself by the low table on which her work-box stood, and fumbled among. spools and scissors, her cyes all the time traveling to a shaded _ corner, where Virginia, thoroughly from a drop fashioned like an acacia, pure, white and lustrous. Within the circumference of its brightest radiance the carpet glowed like beds of liying roses, the rich furniture glistened, and the marbles further off, the exquisite pictures, stl took on a softer coloring and the warm tints of life. Every now and then Virginia moved uneasily—every now and then she sighed. Florida, after a few moments of inde- cision, folded her hands before her on the table till they looked ike the locked fingers of stone, and, fixing her dark eves upon Virginia, she sat as rigid as if transformed into a statue. For some moments she was thus motionless—not a nerve stirring, not a lash of those large, still darkening eyes moving—until a ” #ittle fluttering noise was heard. It was the folds of Virginia’s dress tuat divided the silence with the ticking of the French clock on the mantel-piece. After another shcrt silence, Virginia raised her head and looked out eagerly into the room. Then she lifted herself conmiclooolkks.conn —