At first I could not distinguish the objects within, for a mist was over my sight, which deepened the shadows of the dungeon walls. But as my eye became accustomed to the dimness, I saw a tall, emaciated figure rising from the bed, which nearly filled the limited space which inclosed us. A narrow aperture in the deep, massy stone, admitted all the light which illumined us after the iron door slowly closed. The dark, sunken eyes of the prisoner gleamed like the flash of an expiring taper, wild and fitful, on our entering forms. He was dreadfully altered,--I should scarcely have recognized him through the gloomy shade of his long-neglected hair, and thick, unshorn beard. "Father," said Richard, trying to speak in a cheerful tone, "I have brought you a comforter. A daughter's presence must be more soothing than a son's." I held out my hand as Richard spoke, and he took it as if it were marble. No tenderness softened his countenance,--he rather seemed to recoil from me than to welcome. I noticed a great difference in his reception of Richard. He grasped his hand, and perused his features as if he could not withdraw his gaze. "Are you indeed my son?" he asked, in an unsteady tone. "Do you not mock me? Tell me once more, are you Theresa's child?" "As surely as I believe her an angel in heaven, I am." "Yes,--yes, you have her brow and smile; but why have you come to me again, when I commanded you to stay away? And why have you brought this pale girl here, when she loathes me as an incarnate fiend?" "No,--no," I exclaimed, sinking down on the foot of the bed, in hopelessness of spirit, "I pity, forgive, pray for you, weep for you." "I want neither pity, forgiveness, nor prayers," he sullenly answered. "I want nothing but freedom, and that you cannot give. Go back to your husband, and tell him I curse him for the riches that tempted me, and you for the jewels that betrayed. You might have given me gold instead of diamonds, and then I would have been safe from the hell-hounds of law. Curse on the sordid fear"-- "Stop," cried Richard, seizing the arm he had raised in imprecation, and fixing on him an eye of stem command. "You shall not wound her ears with such foul blasphemy. Utter another word of reproach to her, and I will leave you for ever to the doom you merit. Is this the return you make for her filial devotion? Betrayer of her mother, robber of her husband, coward as well as villain, how dare you blast her with your impious curse?" Richard forgot at that moment he was speaking to a father, in the intensity of his indignation and scorn. His eye burned, his lip quivered, he looked as if he could have hurled him against the granite walls. St. James quailed and writhed out of his grasp. His face turned the hue of ashes, and he staggered back like a drunken man.