The Works of George W. M. Reynolds — page 105: what you’re looking at

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

88 THE COURT OF LONDON “°Tis I, with the colonel,’’ responded the voice of Jessica on the outside of the door. ‘“ Bid the colonel depart as he came. I have changed my mind, I will have nothing to do with him,” replied Mrs. Malpas, speaking through the keyhole, and in accents so low that it was impossible for the colonel, who was with Jessica, to recognize the voice of his wife. Immediately after she had given utterance to these words, Mrs. Malpas turned away trom the door and was caught in the arms of the prince, who strained her to his breast; but he felt that she was trembling all over, while her heart was beating quickly and her bosom was palpitating violently with the excitement of the present scene. ‘“ Now let them all think what they like and do what they like,’’ murmured the prince in the lady’s ear, as he bore her back to the couch. But just at this moment a strange noise, resembling a sudden rush and a short seuffle in the passage, just outside the door, reached the ears of his Royal Highness and Mrs. Malpas. They listened with suspended breath; a door closed opposite, and then all was still once more. ‘What could that be?” asked Mrs. Malpas, in a suffo- cating tone, and again trembling with the excitement of alarm and suspense. ‘Nothing that concerns us,’ responded the prince, straining her with still more frantic violence in his arms, as if by the very power of his caresses he sought to lull the trembling of her form and the fluttering of her heart. But he could not help thinking at the moment that the noise in the passage which had just startled them was some freak or achievement on the part of his coadjutor in this night’s adventure, the redoubtable Captain Tash. ECORMICLIOO KS (E(0) im