Methinks it will never vanish . Whether I look at the windows or the door , there it is framed within them , painted strongly and glowing in the richest tints -- the faces of the portraits , the figures and action of the sketch ! '' He knocked . `` The portraits -- are they within ? '' inquired he of the domestic ; then , recollecting himself , `` Your master and mistress -- are they at home ? '' `` They are , sir , '' said the servant , adding , as he noticed that picturesque aspect of which the painter could never divest himself , `` and the portraits too . '' The guest was admitted into a parlor communicating by a central door with an interior room of the same size . As the first apartment was empty , he passed to the entrance of the second , within which his eyes were greeted by those living personages , as well as their pictured representatives , who had long been the objects of so singular an interest . He involuntarily paused on the threshold . They had not perceived his approach . Walter and Elinor were standing before the portraits , whence the former had just flung back the rich and voluminous folds of the silken curtain , holding its golden tassel with one hand , while the other grasped that of his bride . The pictures , concealed for months , gleamed forth again in undiminished splendor , appearing to throw a sombre light across the room rather than to be disclosed by a borrowed radiance . That of Elinor had been almost prophetic . A pensiveness , and next a gentle sorrow , had successively dwelt upon her countenance , deepening with the lapse of time into a quiet anguish . A mixture of affright would now have made it the very expression of the portrait . Walter 's face was moody and dull or animated only by fitful flashes which left a heavier darkness for their momentary illumination . He looked from Elinor to her portrait , and thence to his own , in the contemplation of which he finally stood absorbed . The painter seemed to hear the step of Destiny approaching behind him on its progress toward its victims . A strange thought darted into his mind . Was not his own the form in which that Destiny had embodied itself , and he a chief agent of the coming evil which he had foreshadowed ?
Still , Walter remained silent before the picture , communing XXXXX it as with his own heart and abandoning himself to the spell of evil influence that the painter had cast upon the features .
Whether before for into of that to upon with within