Page:Clermont - Roche (1798, volume 3).djvu/173

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"Fearful of being pursued, I made the driver, as night approached, turn into an obscure village, some leagues from the road. Here a violent illness, brought on by the dreadful agitation I suffered, detained me two days, and when I recommenced my journey, I was more dead than alive.

"Oh! how impossible to describe the emotions which shook my frame as I approached the mansion of Montmorenci; as I stopped before those gates which I once hoped I should have entered as the acknowledged wife of St. Julian! for many minutes my feelings prevented my declaring to the astonished domestics the purport of my visit; at length I summoned sufficient resolution to desire to be shown into the presence of their Lord. I drew near his apartment more like an unhappy criminal about deprecating vengeance, than an injured sufferer going to implore justice: the moment I beheld his countenance, where pride and sternness only were visible, the faint hope of obtaining his