When he entered the room, she was sitting upon the bed, her eyes earnestly fixed upon the window, from which she was privately indulging a wish to make her escape. Her dress was in much disorder, her fine hair was dishevelled, and the feathers of her riding hat were broken and half falling down, some shading her face, others reaching to her shoulder.
"Poor lady!" cried Albany, approaching her, "how long has she been in this state?"
She started at the sound of a new voice, she looked round,--but what was the astonishment of Albany to see who it was!--He stept back,-he came forward,--he doubted his own senses,--he looked at her earnestly, --he turned from her to look at the woman of the house,--he cast his eyes round the room itself, and then, lifting up his hands, "O sight of woe!" he cried, "the generous and good! the kind reliever of distress! the benign sustainer of misery!--is This Cecilia!"-Cecilia, imperfectly recollecting, though not understanding him, sunk down at his feet, tremblingly called out, "Oh, if he is yet to be saved, if already he is not murdered,--go to him! fly after him! you will presently overtake him, he is only in the next street, I left him there myself, his sword drawn, and covered with human blood!"
"Sweet powers of kindness and compassion!" cried the old man, "look upon this creature with pity! she who raised the depressed, she who cheared the unhappy! she whose liberal hand turned lamentations into joy! who never with a tearless eye could hear the voice of sorrow!--is This she herself!--can This be Cecilia!" "O do not wait to talk!" cried she, "go to him now, or you will never see him more! the hand of death is on him,--cold, clay-cold is its touch! he is breathing his last--Oh murdered Delvile! massacred husband of my heart! groan not so piteously! fly to him, and weep over him!--fly to him and pluck the poniard from his wounded bosom!"
"Oh sounds of anguish and horror!" cried the, melted moralist, tears running quick down his rugged cheeks; "melancholy indeed is this sight, humiliating to morality! such is human strength, such human felicity!-- weak as our virtues, frail as our guilty natures!"
"Ah," cried she, more wildly, "no one will save me now! I am married, and no one will listen to me! ill were the auspices under which I gave my hand! Oh it was a work of darkness, unacceptable and offensive! it has been sealed, therefore, with blood, and to-morrow it will be signed with murder!"