Beautiful Rienzi; or, The Secret Vendetta — page 255: what you’re looking at

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

248 a BEAUTIFUL RIENZL until my own voice sounded vague like the voice in a dream. I think I lay down and slept. «© T awoke to find myself in a bed; my mother’s terrible face bending over me. My head was bandaged; I was so weak that I could scarcely speak. The daylight was stream- ing in. 2 «The bridge!’ I moaned. ‘* Did you find him at the bridge?” ‘«* Hush? she said. ‘You are mad. You have killed your brother, and you are insane. I must send you to an asylum!’ ““My will was quite passive. I believed that I must be insane; to be shut up and treated like an irrational being was an idea which rather pleased me; I was dead to life now. ‘* Before the evening of that day I was an innate of Doctor Oaks’ private asylum, and calmly awaited the develop- ment of the madness which I felt stealing over me. All these weeks of imprisonment I was almost as imbecile as any of my companions; my intellect was dwarfed and petrified. Memory was mercifully erased from my catalogue of torments.” ? «< But when I suddenly saw the face of my sister, gazing at me through the bars, so full of love—so full of sorrow, my heart awoke with a fearful bound. ‘The old, blessed life rushed back to me in a blinding flash of recollection; joy sent the phantom of madness thrilling from my brain: I rushed to embrace my long-lost Ivanilla. -“ These first days with you were very strange and sweet; my mind was yet weak, and I could not grasp at the sorrows of my lot. Your love was enough to engage my attention. 3 ‘“But little by little I awoke from my long trance; I realized that I should never have returned to Guiseppe Rienzi’s roof again; that I did dishonor to my mother and insult to my sweet foster-mother, by remaining; that, possibly, I might bring danger on your heads by returning. to you. ee You remember the trial? I dared throw no light upon it; I almost hoped that I would be condemned, that the curse of my life might end. What was my astonishment to hear that Cecil Beaumont was not dead! that my mother had deceived me, | Eomichooks-co