41/42 The violence of her agitation began to tell physically on her weakened frame. A weight was on her head, a weariness was in all her limbs. She sank lower on the cushions--her eyes closed--the monotonous ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece grew drowsily fainter and fainter on her ear. Little by little she dropped into slumber--slumber so light that she started when a morsel of coal fell into the grate, or when the birds chirped and twittered in their aviary in the winter-garden. She was faintly conscious of persons in the room. |