Ovington's Bank by Stanley J. Weyman — Read

An hour after Arthur had left the house on the Monday morning Josina went slowly up the stairs to her father's room. She was young and the stairs were shallow, but the girl's knees shook under her as she mounted them, as she mounted them one by one, while her hand trembled on the banister. Before now the knees of brave men, going on forlorn hopes, have shaken under them, but, like these men, Josina went on, she ascended step by step. She was frightened, she was horribly frightened, but she had made a vow to herself and she would carry it out. How she would carry it out, how she would find words to blurt out the truth, how she would have the courage to live through that which would follow, she did not know, she could not conceive. But her mind was fixed.

She reached the shabby landing on which two or three sheep-skins laid at the doors of the rooms served for carpet, and there, indeed, she paused awhile and pressed her hand to her side to still the beating of her heart. She gazed through the window. On the sweep below, Calamy was shaking out the cloth, while two or three hens clucked about his feet, and a cat seated at a distance watched the operation with dignity. In the field beyond the brook a dog barked joyously as it rounded up some sheep. Miss Peacock's voice, scolding a maid, came up from below. All was going on as usual, going on callous and heedless: while she-she had that before her which turned her sick and faint, which for her, timid and subject, was almost worse than death.