"For God's sake read this now and grant my request!"
The voice, which seemed to rise from the very heart of the speaker, Lucy knew at once; she trembled violently, and remained for some minutes with eyes which did not dare to look from the ground. A note, she felt, had been left in her hand, and the agonized and earnest tone of that voice, which was dearer to her ear than the fulness of all music, made her impatient yet afraid to read it. As she recovered courage she looked around, and seeing that the attention of all was bent upon the fireworks, and that her father, in particular, leaning on his cane, seemed to enjoy the spectacle with a child's engrossed delight, she glided softly away, and entering unperceived one of the alleys, she read, by a solitary lamp that burnt at its entrance, the following lines written in pencil and in a hurried hand, apparently upon a leaf torn from a pocketbook.
