Linda listened to it all, and by degrees the impossibility of her assenting to such iniquity became less palpable. And though the wickedness of the scheme was still manifest to her, though she felt that, were she to assent to it, she would, in doing so, give herself up finally, body and soul, to the Evil One, yet was she not angry with Ludovic for proposing it. Nay, loving him well enough before, she loved him the better as he pressed her to go with him. But she would not go. She had nothing to say but, No, no, no. It was impossible. She was conscious after a certain fashion that her legs would refuse to carry her to the railway station on such an errand, that her physical strength would have failed her, and that were she to make ever so binding a promise, when the morning came she would not be there. He had again taken her hand, and was using all his eloquence, still speaking in low whispers, when there was heard a cough,--not loud, but very distinct,--Tetchen's cough as she stood at the kitchen door. Ludovic Valcarm, though the necessity for movement was so close upon him, would not leave Linda's hand till he had again pressed a kiss upon her mouth. Now, at last, in this perilous moment, there was some slightest movement on Linda's lips, which he flattered himself he might take as a response. Then, in a moment, he was gone and her door was shut, and he was escaping, after his own fashion, into the darkness,--she knew not whither and she knew not how, except that there was a bitter flavour of brimstone about it all. She seated herself at the foot of the bed lost in amazement. She must first think,--she was bound first to think, of his safety; and yet what in the way of punishment could they do to him comparable to the torments which they could inflict upon her? She listened, and she soon heard Peter Steinmarc creaking in the room below. Tetchen had coughed because Peter was as usual going to his room, but had Ludovic remained at her door no one would have been a bit the wiser. No doubt Ludovic, up among the rafters, was thinking the same thing; but there must be no renewal of their intercourse that night, and therefore Linda bolted her door. As she did so, she swore to herself that she would not unbolt it again that evening at Ludovic's request. No such encroaching request was made to her. She sat for nearly an hour at the foot of her bed, waiting, listening, fearing, thinking, hoping,--hardly hoping, when another step was heard on the stair and in the passage,--a step which she well knew to be that of her aunt Charlotte. Then she arose, and as her aunt drew near she pulled back the bolt and opened the door. The little oil lamp which she held threw a timid fitful light into the gloom, and Linda looked up unconsciously into the darkness of the roof over her head.