The Shadow of Ashlydyat Part 6

"Child! why did you come?" cried Janet G.o.dolphin to Maria.

"I had no idea you did not wish me to come."

"Wish! It is not that. But you are little more than a child, and might be spared these sights."

There appeared to be no particular sight to spare any one. They stood in a group, gazing eagerly. The Dark Plain was stretched out before them, the bare patch of clear ground, the archway behind; all bright in the moonlight. No shadow or shade was to be seen. Charlotte Pain moved to the side of George G.o.dolphin.

"You told me I was fanciful this morning, when I said the Dark Plain put me in mind of a graveyard," she said to him in a half-whisper. "See it now! Those low bushes scattered about look precisely like grave-mounds."

"But we know them to be bushes," returned George.

"That is not the argument. I say they _look_ like it. If you brought a stranger here first by moonlight, and asked him what the Plain was, he would say a graveyard."

"Thus it has ever been!" murmured Janet G.o.dolphin to herself. "At the first coming of the Shadow, it will be here capriciously; visible one night, invisible the next: betokening that the evil has not yet arrived, that it is only hovering! You are sure you saw it, Miss Pain?"

"I am quite sure that I saw a shadow, bearing a strange and distinct form, there, in front of the archway. But I am equally sure it is to be accounted for by natural causes. But that my eyes tell me there is no building, or sign of building above the Dark Plain, I should say it was cast from thence. Some fairies, possibly, may be holding up a sheet there," she carelessly added, "playing at magic lantern in the moonlight."

"Standing in the air," sarcastically returned Miss G.o.dolphin.

"Archimedes offered to move the world with his lever, if the world would only find him a place, apart from itself, to stand on."

"Are you convinced, Janet?" asked George.

"Of what?"

He pointed over the Plain. "That there is nothing uncanny to be seen to-night. I'll send Margery here when I return."

"I am convinced of one thing--that it is getting uncommonly damp," said practical Bessy. "I never stood under these ash-trees in an evening yet, let the atmosphere be ever so cold and clear, but a dampness might be felt. I wonder if it is the nature of ash-trees to exhale it? Maria, the Rector would not thank us for bringing you here."

"Is Miss Hastings so susceptible to cold?" asked Charlotte Pain.

"Not more so than other people are," was Maria's answer.

"It is her child-like, delicate appearance, I suppose, that makes us fancy it," said Bessy G.o.dolphin. "Come, let us depart. If Lady G.o.dolphin could see us here, she would go crazy: she says, you know, that damp brings fever."

They made a simultaneous movement. Their road lay to the right; Charlotte Pain's to the left. "I envy you four," she said, after wishing them good night. "You are a formidable body, numerous enough to do battle with any a.s.sailants you may meet in your way, fairies, or shadows, or fever, or what not. I must encounter them alone."

"Scarcely," replied George G.o.dolphin, as he drew her arm within his, and turned with her in the direction of Ashlydyat.

Arrived at Lady G.o.dolphin's Folly, the Miss G.o.dolphins pa.s.sed indoors; Maria Hastings lingered a moment behind them. She leaned against a white pillar of the terrace, looking forth on the lovely night. Not altogether was that peaceful scene in accordance with her heart, for, in that, warred pa.s.sionate jealousy. Who was Charlotte Pain, she asked herself, that she should come between them with her beauty; with her----

Some one was hastening towards her; crossing the green lawn, springing up the steps of the terrace: and the jealous feeling died away into love.

"Were you waiting for me?" whispered George G.o.dolphin. "We met Verrall, so I resigned mademoiselle to his charge. Maria, how your heart is beating!"

"I was startled when you ran up so quickly; I did not think it could be you," was the evasive answer. "Let me go, please."

"My darling, don't be angry with me: I could not well help myself. You know with whom I would rather have been."

He spoke in the softest whisper; he gazed tenderly into her face, so fair and gentle in the moonlight; he clasped her to him with an impa.s.sioned gesture. And Maria, as she yielded to his tenderness in her pure love, and felt his stolen kisses on her lips, forgot the jealous trouble that was being wrought by Charlotte Pain.

CHAPTER IV.

ALL SOULS' RECTORY.

At the eastern end of Prior's Ash was situated the Church and Rectory of All Souls--a valuable living, the Reverend Isaac Hastings its inc.u.mbent.

The house, enclosed from the high-road by a lofty hedge, was built, like the church, of greystone. It was a commodious residence, but its rooms, excepting one, were small. This one had been added to the house of late years: a long, though somewhat narrow room, its three windows looking on to the flowered lawn. A very pleasant room to sit in on a summer's day; when the gra.s.s was green, and the flowers, with their brightness and perfume, gladdened the senses, and the birds were singing, and the bees and b.u.t.terflies sporting.

Less pleasant to-day. For the skies wore a grey hue; the wind sighed round the house with an ominous sound, telling of the coming winter; and the mossy lawn and the paths were dreary with the yellow leaves, decaying as they lay. Mrs. Hastings, a ladylike woman of middle height and fair complexion, stood at one of these windows, watching the bending of the trees as the wind shook them; watching the falling leaves. She was remarkably susceptible to surrounding influences; seasons and weather held much power over her: but that she was a clergyman's wife, and, as such, obliged to take a very practical part in the duties of life, she might have subsided into a valetudinarian.

A stronger gust sent the leaves rustling up the path, and Mrs. Hastings slightly shivered.

"How I dislike this time of year," she exclaimed. "I wish there were no autumn. I dislike to see the dead leaves."

"I like the autumn: although it heralds in the winter."

The reply came from Mr. Hastings, who was pacing the carpet, thinking over his next day's sermon: for it was Sat.u.r.day morning. Nature had not intended Mr. Hastings for a parson, and his sermons were the bane of his life. An excellent man; a most efficient pastor of a parish; a gentleman; a scholar, abounding in good practical sense; but _not_ a preacher. Sometimes he wrote his sermons, sometimes he tried the extempore plan; but, let him do as he would, there was always a conviction of failure, as to his sermons winning their way to his hearers' hearts. He was under middle height, with keen aquiline features, his dark hair already sprinkled with grey.

"I am glad the wind has changed," remarked the Rector. "We shall say good-bye to the fever. While that warm weather lasted, I always had my fears of its breaking out again. It was only coquetting with us. I wonder----"

Mr. Hastings stopped, as if lapsing into thought. Mrs. Hastings inquired what his "wonder" might be.

"I was thinking of Sir George G.o.dolphin," he continued. "One thought leads to another and another, until we should find them a strange train, if we traced them back to their origin. Beginning with dead leaves, and ending with--metaphysics."

"What are you talking of, Isaac?" his wife asked in surprise.

A half-smile crossed the thin delicate lips of Mr. Hastings. "You spoke of the dead leaves: that led to the thought of the fever; the fever to the bad drainage; the bad drainage to the declaration of Sir George G.o.dolphin that, if he lived until next year, it should be remedied, even though he had to meet the expense himself. Then the train went on to speculate upon whether Sir George would live; and next upon whether this change of weather may not cause my lady to relinquish her journey; and lastly, to Maria. Cold Scotland, if we are to have a season of bleak winds, cannot be beneficial to Sir George."

"Lady G.o.dolphin has set her mind upon going. She is not likely to relinquish it."

"Mark you, Caroline," said Mr. Hastings, halting in his promenade, and standing opposite his wife; "it is her dread of the fever that is sending her to Scotland. But for that, she would not go, now that it is so late in the year. And for Maria's sake I wish she would not. I do not now wish Maria to go to Scotland."

"Why?" asked Mrs. Hastings.

Mr. Hastings knitted his brow. "It is an objection more easily felt than explained."

"When the invitation was given in the summer, you were pleased that she should accept it."

"Yes; I acknowledge it: and, had they gone then, I should have felt no repugnance to the visit. But I do feel a repugnance to it now, so far as Maria is concerned; an unaccountable repugnance. If you ask me to explain it, or to tell you what my reason is, I can only answer that I am unable to do so. It is this want of reason, good or bad, which has prevented my entirely withdrawing the consent I gave. I essayed to do so, when Lady G.o.dolphin was here on Thursday; but she pressed me closely, and, having no sound or plausible argument to bring forward against it, my opposition broke down."

Mrs. Hastings wondered. Never was there a man less given to whims and fancies than the Reverend Isaac Hastings. His actions and thoughts were based on the sound principle of plain matter-of-fact sense: he was practical in all things; there was not a grain of ideality in his composition.

At that moment a visitor's knock was heard. Mrs. Hastings glanced across the hall, and saw her second daughter enter. She wore her grey cashmere cloak, soft and fine in texture, delicate in hue; a pretty morning dress, and a straw bonnet trimmed with white. A healthy colour shone on her delicate face, and her eyes were sparkling with inward happiness.

Very attractive, very ladylike, was Maria Hastings.