noon
Having tasted no food since the dinner of the preceding day , extreme faintness made her feel the necessity of quitting the asylum of her apartment to obtain refreshment , and she was also very anxious to procure liberty for Annette . Willing , however , to defer venturing forth , as long as possible , and considering , whether she should apply to Montoni , or to the compassion of some other person , her excessive anxiety concerning her aunt , at length , overcame her abhorrence of his presence , and she determined to go to him , and to entreat , that he would suffer her to see Madame Montoni . Meanwhile , it was too certain , from the absence of Annette , that some accident had befallen Ludovico , and that she was still in confinement ; Emily , therefore , resolved also to visit the chamber , where she had spoken to her , on the preceding night , and , if the poor girl was yet there , to inform Montoni of her situation . It was near noon , before she ventured from her apartment , and went first to the south gallery , whither she passed without meeting a single person , or hearing a sound , except , now and then , the echo of a distant footstep . It was unnecessary to call Annette , whose lamentations were audible upon the first approach to the gallery , and who , bewailing her own and Ludovico 's fate , told Emily , that she should certainly be starved to death , if she was not let out immediately . Emily replied , that she was going to beg her release of Montoni ; but the terrors of hunger now yielded to those of the Signor , and , when Emily left her , she was loudly entreating , that her place of refuge might be concealed from him . As Emily drew near the great hall , the sounds she heard and the people she met in the passages renewed her alarm .