When we had said good-by to the garden,
there was only half an hour left. We went together to the grave; we
knelt down, side by side, in silence, and kissed the sacred ground. I
thought my heart would have broken. August was the month of my mother's
birthday; and, this time last year, my father and Magdalen and I were
all consulting in secret what present we could make to surprise her with
on the birthday morning.
"If you had seen how Magdalen suffered, you would never doubt her again.
I had to take her from the last resting-place of our father and mother
almost by force. Before we were out of the churchyard she broke from
me and ran back. She dropped on her knees at the grave; tore up from it
passionately a handful of grass; and said something to herself, at the
same moment, which, though I followed her instantly, I did not get near
enough to hear. She turned on me in such a frenzied manner, when I
tried to raise her from the ground--she looked at me with such a fearful
wildness in her eyes--that I felt absolutely terrified at the sight of
her. To my relief, the paroxysm left her as suddenly as it had come. She
thrust away the tuft of grass into the bosom of her dress, and took my
arm and hurried with me out of the churchyard.
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