Thrice Wedded, but Only Once a Wife — page 133: what you’re looking at

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

124 THRICE WEDDED. all their efforts to discover it have proved fruitless. The entrances are so cleverly concealed that it would take a great deal of searching to discover them. I have been told there is one person who has an inkling of its whereabouts; but 1t may be only a story.” , “Do you and your companions neyer go out to enjoy a breath of fresh air or the sunshine?” “Oh, yes, frequently. ‘There is an underground passage to the sea, and we often go out for a sail, but always dressed like high-born ladies, and accompanied by some of the band richly clad as gentlemen, so that any one to see us would think we were some of the gentry out on a pleasure excur- sion. In the same way we often go out horseback riding, though we are never allowed to go where it is thickly settled, lest some of us should give the alarm. We are carefully guarded at all times, and every precaution taken to conceal our identity. Now,” she added, looking up at Robert, archly, ‘‘I have gossiped long enough, so please take your turn and tell me about yourself. Jam getting impatient to know all about you.” Robert, in return, related all that the reader already knows about him, much to the wonder and indignation of his fair listener, who mourned from the very depths of her pure heart that she was the child of a man who was so vile in all his acts and intentions; whose only desire seemed to be to _ work ont revenge and the unhappiness of others. CHAPTER XXI. AN ENEMY’S TRIUMPH. A week passed away, more quickly and pleasantly than Robert could have imagined, and he daily had secret inter- views with the fair Vivien, and her sweet presence soothed him to bear with something of calmness and patience his torturing imprisonment and suspense. _ | Robert told his fair sister, as he called her, of Dora, and of all her enchanting ways, her beauty and accomplishments, painting her in the most glowing colors, until Vivien said that she already loved her, and longed to see one whom she knew must be good and beautiful, to win so noble and true a heart as his own. Strange though it may seem, her own heart was not EComicbooks co n