Here and
there, through the cracking and sinking surface, could be seen
protruding a fair white arm, or a baby face, mingled with the
long, dark tresses of maidens, the golden curls of children, and
the white hairs of old age. The pestilential effluvia arising
from the dreadful mass was so overpowering that both shrank back,
faint and sick, after a moment's survey. It was indeed as Sir
Norman had, said, a horrible grave wherein to lie.
Meantime the driver, with an eye to business, and no time for
such nonsense as melancholy moralizing, had laid the body of the
young girl on the ground, and briskly turned his cart and dumped
the remainder of his load into the pit. Then, having flung a few
handfuls of clay over it, he unwound the sheet, and kneeling
beside the body, prepared to remove the jewels. The rays of the
moon and his dark lantern fell on the lovely, snow-white face
together, and Sir Norman groaned despairingly as he saw its
death-cold rigidity. The man had stripped the rings off the
fingers, the bracelets off the arms; but as he was about to
perform the same operation toward the necklace, he was stopped by
a startling interruption enough.
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