|
Prev
| Next
| Contents
THE EIGHTH DAY.
THE wind that I saw in the sky yesterday has come. It sweeps down
our little valley in angry howling gusts, and drives the heavy
showers before it in great sheets of spray.
There are some people who find a strangely exciting effect
produced on their spirits by the noise, and rush, and tumult of
the elements on a stormy day. It has never been so with me, and
it is less so than ever now. I can hardly bear to think of my son
at sea in such a tempest as this. While I can still get no news
of his ship, morbid fancies beset me which I vainly try to shake
off. I see the trees through my window bending before the wind.
Are the masts of the good ship bending like them at this moment?
I hear the wash of the driving rain. Is he hearing the thunder
of the raging waves? If he had only come back last night!--it is
vain to dwell on it, but the thought will haunt me--if he had
only come back last night!
I tried to speak cautiously about him again to Jessie, as Owen
had advised me; but I am so old and feeble now that this
ill-omened storm has upset me, and I could not feel sure enough
of my own self-control to venture on matching myself to-day
against a light-hearted, lively girl, with all her wits about
her. It is so important that I should not betray George--it would
be so inexcusable on my part if his interests suffered, even
accidentally, in my hands.
This was a trying day for our guest. Her few trifling indoor
resources had, as I could see, begun to lose their attractions
for her at last. If we were not now getting to the end of the
stories, and to the end, therefore, of the Ten Days also, our
chance of keeping her much longer at the Glen Tower would be a
very poor one.
It was, I think, a great relief for us all to be summoned
together this evening for a definite purpose. The wind had fallen
a little as it got on toward dusk. To hear it growing gradually
fainter and fainter in the valley below added immeasurably to the
comforting influence of the blazing fire and the cheerful lights
when the shutters were closed for the night.
The number drawn happened to be the last of the series--Ten--and
the last also of the stories which I had written. There were now
but two numbers left in the bowl. Owen and Morgan had each one
reading more to accomplish before our guest's stay came to an
end, and the manuscripts in the Purple Volume were all exhausted.
"This new story of mine," I said, "is not, like the story I last
read, a narrative of adventure happening to myself, but of
adventures that happened to a lady of my acquaintance. I was
brought into contact, in the first instance, with one of her male
relatives, and, in the second instance, with the lady herself, by
certain professional circumstances which I need not particularly
describe. They involved a dry question of wills and title-deeds
in no way connected with this story, but sufficiently important
to interest me as a lawyer. The case came to trial at the Assizes
on my circuit, and I won it in the face of some very strong
points, very well put, on the other side. I was in poor health at
the time, and my exertions so completely knocked me up that I was
confined to bed in my lodgings for a week or more--"
"And the grateful lady came and nursed you, I suppose," said the
Queen of Hearts, in her smart, off-hand way.
"The grateful lady did something much more natural in her
position, and much more useful in mine," I answered--"she sent
her servant to attend on me. He was an elderly man, who had been
in her service since the time of her first marriage, and he was
also one of the most sensible and well-informed persons whom I
have ever met with in his station of life. From hints which he
dropped while he was at my bedside, I discovered for the first
time that his mistress had been unfortunate in her second
marriage, and that the troubles of that period of her life had
ended in one of the most singular events which had happened in
that part of England for many a long day past. It is hardly
necessary to say that, before I allowed the man to enter into any
particulars, I stipulated that he should obtain his mistress's
leave to communicate what he knew. Having gained this, and having
further surprised me by mentioning that he had been himself
connected with all the circumstances, he told me the whole story
in the fullest detail. I have now tried to reproduce it as nearly
as I could in his own language. Imagine, therefore, that I am
just languidly recovering in bed, and that a respectable elderly
man, in quiet black costume, is sitting at my pillow and speaking
to me in these terms--"
Thus ending my little preface, I opened the manuscript and began
my last story.
Prev
| Next
| Contents
|
