This table was directly in his line of vision; and beside it stood
a woman with a small revolver in her hands. The lights being behind her,
Woburn could only infer her youth from her slender silhouette and the
nimbus of fair hair defining her head. Her dress seemed dark and simple,
and on a chair under one of the gas-jets lay a jacket edged with cheap fur
and a small travelling-bag. He could not see the other end of the room,
but something in her manner told him that she was alone. At length she put
the revolver down and took up a letter that lay on the table. She drew the
letter from its envelope and read it over two or three times; then she put
it back, sealing the envelope, and placing it conspicuously against the
mirror of the dressing-table.
There was so grave a significance in this dumb-show that Woburn felt sure
that her next act would be to return to the table and take up the
revolver; but he had not reckoned on the vanity of woman. After putting
the letter in place she still lingered at the mirror, standing a little
sideways, so that he could now see her face, which was distinctly pretty,
but of a small and unelastic mould, inadequate to the expression of the
larger emotions. For some moments she continued to study herself with the
expression of a child looking at a playmate who has been scolded; then she
turned to the table and lifted the revolver to her forehead.
A sudden crash made her arm drop, and sent her darting backward to the
opposite side of the room.
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