Lecount, with a fierce hissing
emphasis on every syllable. Her left hand clinched itself stealthily as
she spoke. It was the hand in which she had concealed the fragment of
stuff from Magdalen's gown--the hand which held it fast at that moment.
"What do you mean?" asked Magdalen, pushing her back.
Mrs. Lecount glided away politely to open the house door.
"I mean nothing now," she said; "wait a little, and time may show. One
last question, ma'am, before I bid you good-by. When your pupil was a
little innocent child, did she ever amuse herself by building a house of
cards?"
Magdalen impatiently answered by a gesture in the affirmative.
"Did you ever see her build up the house higher and higher," proceeded
Mrs. Lecount, "till it was quite a pagoda of cards? Did you ever see her
open her little child's eyes wide and look at it, and feel so proud of
what she had done already that she wanted to do more? Did you ever see
her steady her pretty little hand, and hold her innocent breath, and
put one other card on the top, and lay the whole house, the instant
afterward, a heap of ruins on the table? Ah, you have seen that. Give
her, if you please, a friendly message from me.
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