Springing to her feet
with an eagerness and energy that was quite astonishing after her late
prostration, she rushed forward to her uncle, and looked appealingly
into his face, though she did not speak, while her hand grasped
tenaciously his arm.
"What means the girl?" exclaimed Munro, now apprehensive of some mental
derangement. She spoke, with a deep emphasis, but a single sentence:--
"It is written--thou shalt do no murder!"
The solemn tone--the sudden, the almost fierce action--the peculiar
abruptness of the apostrophe--the whitely-robed, the almost spiritual
elevation of figure--all so dramatic--combined necessarily to startle
and surprise; and, for a few moments, no answer was returned to the
unlooked-for speech. But the effect could not be permanent upon minds
made familiar with the thousand forms of human and strong energies.
Munro, after a brief pause, replied--
"Who speaks of murder, girl? Why this wild, this uncalled-for
exhortation?"
"Not wild, not uncalled-for, uncle, but most necessary.
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