"The death-candles were lighted in the chapel, where the custom was for the exposure of the body to repose a day and a night.
"I was shrouded, dressed in white, as I had not taken the vow; my hands crossed on my bosom, and a wreath of white blossoms placed on my brow.
"When the coffin was brought in, I felt a shiver pass over my body; for, I repeat, I saw all that happened as though I were my second self standing invisibly beside my counter-part.
"I was placed in the coffin, and after my time of lying in state, left with only the hospital sister to watch me.
"A dreadful thought tormented me in this lethargy--that I should be buried living on the morrow unless some interposition came.
"Each stroke of the time bell echoed in my heart, for I was listening--doleful idea! to my own death-knell.
"Heaven alone knows what efforts I made to break the iron bonds which held me down on the bier; but it had pity on me in my frozen sleep, since here I am.
"At the first stroke, I felt that convulsion experienced whenever Acharat approached me; a shock came to my heart; I saw him appear in the chapel doorway."
"Was it fright that you felt?" asked Count Fenix.
"No, no; it was joy, bliss, ecstasy, for I knew that he came to tear me from the desperate death which I so abhorred. Slowly he came up to my coffin; he smiled on me as he gazed for a moment, and he said:
"'Are you glad to live? Then come with me.'
"All the bonds snapped at his call; I rose, extricated myself from the bier as from the grave clothes, and passed by the slumbering nun. I followed him who for the second time had snatched me from death.
"Out in the courtyard I beheld the sky spangled with stars which never more had I expected to see. I felt that cool night air which blesses not the dead, but which is so refreshing to the living.
"'Now,' said my liberator, 'before quitting the convent, choose between it and me. Will you be a nun, or will you be my wife?' I wanted to be his wife, and I followed him.
"The tower gate was closed and locked. He asked where were the keys, and as I said in the pocket of the wardress, who slept within, he sent me there to get them.
"Five minutes after we were in the street. I took his arm and we ran to the end of Subiaco village. A hundred paces beyond the last house a postchaise was waiting, all ready. We got in, and off it went at a gallop."