Lady Audley's Secret. M. E. Braddon

his brain had grown bewildered, for my lady, in his portrait of her, had something of the aspect of a beautiful fiend.

      Her crimson dress, exaggerated like all the rest in this strange picture, hung about her in folds that looked like flames, her fair head peeping out of the lurid mass of color as if out of a raging furnace. Indeed the crimson dress, the sunshine on the face, the red gold gleaming in the yellow hair, the ripe scarlet of the pouting lips, the glowing colors of each accessory of the minutely painted background, all combined to render the first effect of the painting by no means an agreeable one.

      But strange as the picture was, it could not have made any great impression on George Talboys, for he sat before it for about a quarter of an hour without uttering a word—only staring blankly at the painted canvas, with the candlestick grasped in his strong right hand, and his left arm hanging loosely by his side. He sat so long in this attitude, that Robert turned round at last.

      "Why, George, I thought you had gone to sleep!"

      "I had almost."

      "You've caught a cold from standing in that damp tapestried room. Mark my words, George Talboys, you've caught a cold; you're as hoarse as a raven. But come along."

      Robert Audley took the candle from his friend's hand, and crept back through the secret passage, followed by George—very quiet, but scarcely more quiet than usual.