"Where are my jewels? I have been robbed. Wretches, tell me where are those jewels which I have guarded for twenty years?"
The excitement was fatal--she fell back, and expired. The confusion which followed this sudden and as yet unexpected event drowned for a time the effect resulting from the extraordinary exclamation. The women were busy in various ways, and Augustus ran to support me, who at first, staggered by the exclamations, was rendered senseless by what so immediately followed. I swooned in his arms, and, when I recovered, found myself in my own parlour, with Mrs Ball leaning over me. Augustus, alarmed by the length of time I remained insensible, had hastened away for the doctor, and left me to the tender mercies of the mother of my rival. When I looked up, the first object that met my eyes was my trunk, where were deposited the jewels I had got gifted to me by my aunt; and, by the power of association, I heard ringing in my ears the words, "I have been robbed." The air seemed thick, from the impediment which my swelling heart offered to my powers of respiration, and, holding out my hand, I pushed away her who held me. The resistance offered to my hands directed my attention to the face of Mrs Ball, who, smiling, with a cutting satire, which spoke her suspicions--
"Who robbed your aunt, Miss Martha?" inquired she. "Why did you faint when she mentioned the loss of her jewels?"
"Ha!" answered I, with an exclamation, rubbing my forehead, and still searching in my mind for a full recollection of all that had taken place; "I wish my aunt to explain, in presence of Mrs Merling, and you, and Augustus, her extraordinary words. Come, come--let us go to her--she must explain, she must free me of the imputation."
"Your aunt is dead, young woman; you saw her die," she replied, with more bitter irony. "You have not yet recovered yourself. It was her death-bed confession. Why did it shake you so? _You_ never can be suspected."