Janet laid down her knitting. "What do you mean? That there should be two mistresses in the house, she and I? No, no, Thomas; the daftest old wife in the parish would tell you that does not do."

"Not two mistresses. You would be sole mistress, as you are now: I and Ethel your guests. Janet, indeed it would be the better plan. By the spring we should see how Sir George went on. If he improved, then the question could be definitively settled: and either you or I would take up our residence elsewhere. If he does not improve, I fear, Janet, that spring will have seen the end."

Something in the words appeared particularly to excite Janet's attention. She gazed at Thomas as if she would search him through and through. "By spring!" she repeated. "When, then, do you contemplate marrying Ethel?"

"I should like her to be mine by Christmas," was the low answer.

"Thomas! And December close upon us!"

"If not, some time in January," he continued, paying no attention to her surprise. "It is so decided."

Miss G.o.dolphin drew a long breath. "With whom is it decided?"

"With Ethel."

"You would marry a wife without a home to bring her to? Had thoughtless George told me that he was going to do such a thing, I could have believed it of him. Not of you, Thomas."

"Janet, the home shall no longer be a barrier to us. I wish you would receive Ethel here as your guest."

"It is not likely that she would come. The first thing a married woman looks for is to have a home of her own."

Thomas smiled. "Not come, Janet? Have you yet to learn how una.s.suming and meek is the character of Ethel? We have spoken of this plan together, and Ethel's only fear is, lest she should 'be in Miss G.o.dolphin's way.' Failing to carry out this project, Janet--for I see you are, as I thought you would be, prejudiced against it--I shall hire a lodging as near to the bank as may be, and there I shall take Ethel."

"Would it be seemly that the heir of Ashlydyat should go into lodgings on his marriage?" asked Janet, grief and sternness in her tone.

"Things are seemly or unseemly, Janet, according to circ.u.mstances. It would be more seemly for the heir of Ashlydyat to take temporary lodgings while waiting for Ashlydyat, than to turn his sisters from their home for a month, or a few months, as the case might be. The pleasantest plan would be for me to bring Ethel here: as your guest. It is what she and I should both like. If you object to this, I shall take her elsewhere. Bessy and Cecil would be delighted with the arrangement: they are fond of Ethel."

"And when children begin to come, Thomas?" cried Miss G.o.dolphin in her old-fashioned, steady, Scotch manner. She had a great deal of her mother about her.

Thomas's lips parted with a quaint smile. "Things will be decided, one way or the other, months before children shall have had time to arrive."

Janet knitted a whole row before she spoke again. "I will take a few hours to reflect upon it, Thomas," she said then.

"Do so," he replied, rising and glancing at the timepiece. "Half-past seven! What time will Cecil expect me? I wish to spend half an hour with Ethel. Shall I go for Cecil before, or afterwards?"

"Go for Cecil at once, Thomas. It will be better for her to be home early."

Thomas G.o.dolphin went to the hall-door and looked out upon the night. He was considering whether he need put on an overcoat. It was a bright moonlight night, warm and genial. So he shut the door, and started. "I wish the cold would come!" he exclaimed, half aloud. He was thinking of the fever, which still clung obstinately to Prior's Ash, showing itself fitfully and partially in fresh places about every third or fourth day.

He took the foot-path, down Crosse Street: a lonely way, and at night especially unfrequented. In one part of it, as he ascended near Ashlydyat, the pathway was so narrow that two people could scarcely walk abreast without touching the ash-trees growing on either side and meeting overhead. A murder had been committed on this spot a few years before: a sad tale of barbarity, offered to a girl by one who professed to be her lover. She lay buried in All Souls' churchyard; and he within the walls of the county prison where he had been executed. Of course the rumour went that her ghost "walked" there, the natural sequence to these dark tales; and, what with that, and what with the loneliness of the place, few could be found in it after dark.

Thomas G.o.dolphin went steadily on, his thoughts running upon the subject of his conversation with Janet. It is probable that but for the difficulty touching a residence, Ethel would have been his in the past autumn. When anything should happen to Sir George, Thomas would be in possession of Ashlydyat three months afterwards; such had been the agreement with Mr. Verrall when he took Ashlydyat. Not in his father's lifetime would Thomas G.o.dolphin (clinging to the fancies and traditions which had descended with the old place) consent to take up his abode as master of Ashlydyat; but no longer than was absolutely necessary would he remain out of it as soon as it was his own. George would then remove to the bank, which would still be his sister's home, as it was now. In the event of George's marrying, the Miss G.o.dolphins would finally leave it: but George G.o.dolphin did not, as far as people saw, give indications that he was likely to marry. In the precarious state of Sir George's health--and it was pretty sure he would soon either get better or worse--these changes might take place any day: therefore it was not desirable that the Miss G.o.dolphins should leave the bank, and that the trouble and expense of setting up and furnishing a house for them should be incurred. Of course _they_ could not go into lodgings. Altogether, if Janet could only be brought to see it, Thomas's plan was the best--that his young bride should be Janet's guest for a short time.

It was through the upper part of this dark path, which was called the Ash-tree Walk, that George G.o.dolphin had taken Maria Hastings, the night they had left Lady G.o.dolphin's dinner-table to visit the Dark Plain.

Thomas, in due course, arrived at the end of the walk, and pa.s.sed through the turnstile. Lady G.o.dolphin's Folly lay on the right, high and white and clear in the moonbeams. Ashlydyat lay to the left, dark and grey, and almost hidden by the trees. Grey as it was, Thomas looked at it fondly: his heart yearned to it: and it was to be the future home of himself and Ethel!

"Holloa! who's this? Oh, I beg your pardon, Mr. G.o.dolphin!"

The speaker was Snow, the surgeon. He had come swiftly upon Thomas G.o.dolphin, turning the corner round the ash-trees from the Dark Plain.

That he had been to Ashlydyat was certain, for the road led nowhere else. Thomas did not know that illness was in the house.

"Neither did I," said Mr. Snow in answer to the remark, "until an hour ago, when I was sent for in haste."

A thought crossed Thomas G.o.dolphin. "Not a case of fever, I hope!"

"No. I think that's leaving us. There has been an accident at Ashlydyat to Mrs. Verrall. At least, what might have been an accident, I should rather say," added the surgeon, correcting himself. "The injury is so slight as not to be worth the name of one."

"What has happened?" asked Thomas G.o.dolphin.

"She managed to set her sleeve on fire: a white lace or muslin sleeve, falling below the silk sleeve of her gown. In standing near a candle, the flame caught it. But now, look at that young woman's presence of mind! Instead of wasting moments in screams, or running through the house from top to bottom, as most people would have done, she instantly threw herself down upon the rug, and rolled herself in it. That's the sort of woman to go through life."

"Is she much burnt?"

"Pooh! Many a child gets a worse burn a dozen times in its first dozen years. The arm between the elbow and the wrist is slightly scorched.

It's nothing. They need not have sent for me. The application of a little cold water will take out all the fire. Your sister Cecilia was ten times more alarmed than Mrs. Verrall."

"I am truly glad it is no worse!" said Thomas G.o.dolphin. "I feared fever might have found its way there."

"That is taking its departure; as I think. And, the sooner it goes, the better. It has been capricious as the smiles of a coquette. How strange it is, that not a soul, down by those Pollard pigsties, should have had it, except the Bonds!"

"It is equally strange that, in many houses, it should have attacked only one inmate, and spared the rest. What do you think now of Sarah Anne Grame?"

Mr. Snow shook his head, and his voice grew insensibly low. "In my opinion she is sinking fast. I found her worse this afternoon; weaker than she has been at all. Lady Sarah said, 'If she could get her to Ventnor?'--'If she could get her to Hastings?' But the removal would kill her: she'd die on the road. It will be a terrible blow to Lady Sarah, if it does come: and--though it may seem harsh to say it--a retort upon her selfishness. Did you know that they used to make Ethel head nurse, while the fever was upon her?"

"No!" exclaimed Thomas G.o.dolphin.

"They did, then. My lady inadvertently let it out to-day. Dear child! If she had caught it, I should never have forgiven her mother, whatever you may have done. Good night. I have a dozen visits now to pay before bedtime."

"Worse!" soliloquized Thomas G.o.dolphin, as he stepped on. "Poor, peevish Sarah Anne! But--I wonder," he hesitated as the thought struck him, "whether, if the worst should come, as Snow seems to antic.i.p.ate, it would put off Ethel's marriage? What with one delay and another----"

Thomas G.o.dolphin's voice ceased, and his heart stood still. He had turned the corner, to the front of the ash-tree grove, and stretching out before him was the Dark Plain, with its weird-like bushes, so like graves, and--_its Shadow_, lying cold and still in the white moonlight.

Yes! there surely lay the Shadow of Ashlydyat. The grey archway rose behind it; the flat plain extended out before it, and the Shadow was between them, all too distinctly visible.

The first shock over, Thomas G.o.dolphin's pulses coursed on again. He had seen that Shadow before in his lifetime, but he halted to gaze at it again. It was very palpable. The bier, as it looked in the middle, a mourner at the head, a mourner at the foot, each--as a spectator could fancy--with bowed heads. In spite of the superst.i.tion touching this strange Shadow in which Thomas G.o.dolphin had been brought up, he looked round now for some natural explanation of it. He was a man of intellect, a man of the world, a man who played his full share in the practical business of everyday life: and such men are not given to acknowledging superst.i.tious fancies in this age of enlightenment, no matter what bent may have been given to their minds in childhood.

Therefore Thomas G.o.dolphin ranged his eyes round and round in the air, and could see nothing that would solve the mystery. "I wonder whether it be possible that certain states of the atmosphere should give out these shadows?" he soliloquized. "But--if so--why should it invariably appear in that one precise spot; and in no other? Could Snow have seen it, I wonder?"

He walked on towards Ashlydyat, his head always turned, looking at the Shadow. "I am glad Janet does not see it! It would frighten her into a belief that my father's end was near," came his next thought.

Mrs. Verrall, playing the invalid, lay on a sofa, her auburn hair somewhat ruffled, her pretty pink cheeks flushed, her satin slippers peeping out; altogether challenging admiration. The damaged arm, its silk sleeve pinned up, was stretched out on a cushion, a small delicate cambric handkerchief, saturated with water, resting lightly on the burn.

A basin of water stood near, with a similar handkerchief lying in it, and Mrs. Verrall's maid was at hand to change the handkerchiefs as might be required. Thomas G.o.dolphin drew a chair near to Mrs. Verrall, and listened to the account of the accident, giving her his full sympathy, for it might have been a bad one.

"You must possess great presence of mind," he observed. "I think your showing it, as you have done in this instance, has won Mr. Snow's heart."

Mrs. Verrall laughed. "I believe I do possess presence of mind. And so does Charlotte. Once we were out with some friends in a barouche, and the horses took fright, ran up a bank, turned the carriage over, and nearly kicked it to pieces. While all those with us were fearfully frightened, Charlotte and I remained calm and cool."

"It is a good thing for you," he observed.