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After this, with his usual caution, he shut and bolted the door, and
having put the key in his pocket, ascended the steps of the altar,
and for some time traversed the little platform from which the priest
usually addresses the congregation.
Until this night I had never contemplated the man's countenance with any
particular interest; but as he walked the platform, I had an opportunity
of observing him more closely. He was slight in person, apparently not
thirty; and, on a first view, appeared to have nothing remarkable in his
dress or features. I, however, was not the only person whose eyes were
fixed upon him at that moment; in fact, every one present observed him
with equal interest, for hitherto he had kept the object of the meeting
perfectly secret, and of course we all felt anxious to know it. It was
while he traversed the platform that I scrutinized his features with a
hope, if possible, to glean from them some evidence of what was passing
within him. I could, however, mark but little, and that little was at
first rather from the intelligence which seemed to subsist between him
and those whom I have already mentioned as standing against the altar,
than from any indication of his own. Their gleaming eyes were fixed upon
him with an intensity of savage and demon-like hope, which blazed out in
flashes of malignant triumph, as upon turning, he threw a cool but rapid
glance at them, to intimate the progress he was making in the subject to
which he devoted the undivided energies of his mind.
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