A thrill vibrated through her inmost soul as she asked herself these questions. She fell on her knees, and lifting her clasped hands, exclaimed in an outburst of enthusiasm,-- "Oh, Merciful and Beneficent Creator! I cannot believe that Thou wouldst utterly abandon the meanest of thy creatures. Even here, on the brink of terrors more hideous than the most cruel death, I still hope, I still believe that Thou wilt show me a way of deliverance!" The Octoroon arose from her knees, a new creature after the utterance of this heartfelt prayer. Her very countenance seemed as if transfigured by the sublime emotions of the moment. A holy light shone from her tearless eyes; a faint flush of crimson relieved the pallor of her cheek. "My father abandons me to my fate. Even he who was to be my husband can do no more to save me. It is to Heaven, then, that I turn, and to One above who is stronger than all earthly friends." The apartment to which Cora had been conducted was on the upper floor of the villa; but the ceilings of the lower chambers were far from lofty, and the window from which the Octoroon looked was scarcely eleven feet from the ground. Under this window ran a rustic colonnade with slender pilasters, round which hung the leaves and blossoms of the luxuriant creeping-plants familiar to the South. The roof of this colonnade formed a balcony before Cora's window. For some moments the Octoroon stood at the open casement, gazing on the scene beneath her--lost in thought. "If I remain in this house," she murmured, "I am utterly in the power of that base man. Another moment, and he may enter this chamber; again I may hear those words which are poison to my soul; and this time he may force me to listen to his infamous proposals. All those beneath this roof are the slaves of his will--it were hopeless, then, to look for help from them; but beneath that purple vault I might surely be safer; and at the worst the river is near at hand." She shuddered as she spoke. To this girl, religiously educated, there was something horrible in the idea of suicide. It seemed a doubt of Providence even to think of this worst and last resource. But on one thing she had determined, and that was to escape from the house to the gardens below; once there, she might find her way to some adjoining plantation, where she might meet with some benevolent creature who would interfere to shield her from her hated master. It was not slavery she feared, it was dishonor. The rope with which she had been bound still hung to one of her wrists. This rope might be the means of saving her. She examined the door of her chamber and found that it was locked on the outside. "So much the better," she thought; "he believes his prisoner to be safe. He thinks that I would not dare a leap of a few feet even to escape from him. How little he knows of a woman's power in the moment of desperation!"