XXIV.
In vain I tossed and turned on my pillow; I could not sleep. The
thousand impressions of the preceding days were traced so vividly on my
mind that I could not believe they were past, and I seemed to hear and
see over again all I had seen or heard the previous day. The fever of
my soul had extended to my body. I rose and laid down again without
finding repose. At last I gave it up. I tried by bodily motion to calm
the agitation of my mind; I opened the window, turned over the leaves
of books which I did not understand as I read them, paced up and down,
and changed the position of my table and my chair a dozen times,
without finding a place where I could bear to spend the night. All this
noise was heard in the adjoining room; and my steps disturbed the poor
invalid, who, doubtless, was as wakeful as I was. I heard a light step
on the creaking floor approach the bolted oak door which separated her
sitting-room from my bedroom; I listened with my ear close to the door,
and heard a suppressed breathing, and the rustle of a silk gown against
the wall.
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