Was she watched?
Were all means of communicating with me, even in secret, carefully removed from her?
I looked oftener and oftener into the doctor's study as those questions occurred to me; but he never quitted it without locking the writing-desk first--he never left any papers scattered on the table, and he was never absent from the room at any special times and seasons that could be previously calculated upon.

I began to despair, and to feel in my lonely moments a yearning to renew that childish experiment of crying, which I have already adverted to, in the way of confession.
Moralists will be glad to hear that I really suffered acute mental misery at this time of my life.

My state of depression would have gratified the most exacting of Methodists; and my penitent face would have made my fortune if I could only have been exhibited by a reformatory association on the platform of Exeter Hall.
How much longer was this to last?
Whither should I turn my steps when I regained my freedom?
In what direction throughout all England should I begin to look for Alicia?
Sleeping and walking--working and idling--those were now my constant thoughts.

I did my best to prepare myself for every emergency that could happen; I tried to arm myself beforehand against every possible accident that could befall me.

While I was still hard at work sharpening my faculties and disciplining my energies in this way, an accident befell the doctor, on the possibility of which I had not dared to calculate, even in my most hopeful moments..