Chapter 3

What was to be done next? was the question that I asked myself. As for

Lucy, she would fain have submitted to the doom that lay upon her. Her

gentleness and piety, under the pressure of so horrible a life, seemed

over-passive to me. She never complained. Mrs. Clarke complained more

than ever. As for me, I was more in love with the real Lucy than ever;

but I shrunk from the false similitude with an intensity proportioned

to my love. I found out by instinct that Mrs. Clarke had occasional

temptations to leave Lucy. The good lady's nerves were shaken, and,

from what she said, I could almost have concluded that the object of

the Double was to drive away from Lucy this last and almost earliest

friend. At times, I could scarcely bear to own it, but I myself felt

inclined to turn recreant; and I would accuse Lucy of being too

patient--too resigned. One after another, she won the little children

of Coldholme. (Mrs. Clarke and she had resolved to stay there, for was

it not as good a place as any other to such as they? and did not all

our faint hopes rest on Bridget--never seen or heard of now, but still

we trusted to come back, or give some token?) So, as I say, one after

another, the little children came about my Lucy, won by her soft tones,

and her gentle smiles, and kind actions. Alas! one after another they

fell away, and shrunk from her path with blanching terror; and we too

surely guessed the reason why. It was the last drop. I could bear it no

longer. I resolved no more to linger around the spot, but to go back to

my uncle, and among the learned divines of the city of London, seek for

some power whereby to annul the curse.

My uncle, meanwhile, had obtained all the requisite testimonials

relating to Lucy's descent and birth, from the Irish lawyers, and from

Mr. Gisborne. The latter gentleman had written from abroad (he was

again serving in the Austrian army), a letter alternately passionately

self-reproachful and stoically repellent. It was evident that when he

thought of Mary--her short life--how he had wronged her, and of her

violent death, he could hardly find words severe enough for his own

conduct; and from this point of view, the curse that Bridget had laid

upon him and his was regarded by him as a prophetic doom, to the

utterance of which she was moved by a Higher Power, working for the

fulfilment of a deeper vengeance than for the death of the poor dog.

But then, again, when he came to speak of his daughter, the repugnance

which the conduct of the demoniac creature had produced in his mind,

was but ill disguised under a show of profound indifference as to

Lucy's fate. One almost felt as if he would have been as content to put

her out of existence, as he would have been to destroy some disgusting

reptile that had invaded his chamber or his couch.

The great Fitzgerald property was Lucy's; and that was all--was

nothing.

My uncle and I sat in the gloom of a London November evening, in our

house in Ormond Street. _I_ was out of health, and felt as if I were in

an inextricable coil of misery. Lucy and I wrote to each other, but

that was little; and we dared not see each other for dread of the

fearful Third, who had more than once taken her place at our meetings.

My uncle had, on the day I speak of, bidden prayers to be put up, on

the ensuing Sabbath, in many a church and meeting-house in London, for

one grievously tormented by an evil spirit. He had faith in prayers--I

had none; I was fast losing faith in all things. So we sat--he trying

to interest me in the old talk of other days, I oppressed by one

thought--when our old servant, Anthony, opened the door, and, without

speaking, showed in a very gentlemanly and prepossessing man, who had

something remarkable about his dress, betraying his profession to be

that of the Roman Catholic priesthood. He glanced at my uncle first,

then at me. It was to me he bowed. 'I did not give my name,' said he,

'because you would hardly have recognised it; unless, sir, when in the

north, you heard of Father Bernard, the chaplain at Stoney Hurst?'

I remembered afterwards that I had heard of him, but at the time I had

utterly forgotten it; so I professed myself a complete stranger to him;

while my ever-hospitable uncle, although hating a papist as much as it

was in his nature to hate anything, placed a chair for the visitor, and

bade Anthony bring glasses and a fresh jug of claret.

Father Bernard received this courtesy with the graceful ease and

pleasant acknowledgment which belongs to the man of the world. Then he

turned to scan me with his keen glance. After some slight conversation,

entered into on his part, I am certain, with an intention of

discovering on what terms of confidence I stood with my uncle, he

paused, and said gravely:

'I am sent here with a message to you, sir, from a woman to whom you

have shown kindness, and who is one of my penitents, in Antwerp--one

Bridget Fitzgerald.'

'Bridget Fitzgerald!' exclaimed I. 'In Antwerp? Tell me, sir, all that

you can about her.'

'There is much to be said,' he replied. 'But may I inquire if this

gentleman--if your uncle is acquainted with the particulars of which

you and I stand informed?'

'All that I know, he knows,' said I, eagerly laying my hand on my

uncle's arm, as he made a motion as if to quit the room.

'Then I have to speak before two gentlemen who, however they may differ

from me in faith, are yet fully impressed with the fact, that there are

evil powers going about continually to take cognizance of our evil

thoughts; and, if their Master gives them power, to bring them into

overt action. Such is my theory of the nature of that sin, of which I

dare not disbelieve--as some sceptics would have us do--the sin of

witchcraft. Of this deadly sin, you and I are aware Bridget Fitzgerald

has been guilty. Since you saw her last, many prayers have been offered

in our churches, many masses sung, many penances undergone, in order

that, if God and the Holy Saints so willed it, her sin might be blotted

out. But it has not been so willed.'

'Explain to me,' said I, 'who you are, and how you come connected with

Bridget. Why is she at Antwerp? I pray you, sir, tell me more. If I am

impatient, excuse me; I am ill and feverish, and in consequence

bewildered.'

There was something to me inexpressibly soothing in the tone of voice

with which he began to narrate, as it were from the beginning, his

acquaintance with Bridget.

'I had known Mr. and Mrs. Starkey during their residence abroad, and so

it fell out naturally that, when I came as chaplain to the Sherburnes

at Stoney Hurst, our acquaintance was renewed; and thus I became the

confessor of the whole family, isolated as they were from the offices

of the Church, Sherburne being their nearest neighbour who professed

the true faith. Of course, you are aware that facts revealed in

confession are sealed as in the grave; but I learnt enough of Bridget's

character to be convinced that I had to do with no common woman; one

powerful for good as for evil. I believe that I was able to give her

spiritual assistance from time to time, and that she looked upon me as

a servant of that Holy Church, which has such wonderful power of moving

men's hearts, and relieving them of the burden of their sins. I have

known her cross the moors on the wildest nights of storm, to confess

and be absolved; and then she would return, calmed and subdued, to her

daily work about her mistress, no one witting where she had been during

the hours that most passed in sleep upon their beds. After her

daughter's departure--after Mary's mysterious disappearance--I had to

impose many a long penance, in order to wash away the sin of impatient

repining that was fast leading her into the deeper guilt of blasphemy.

She set out on that long journey of which you have possibly heard--that

fruitless journey in search of Mary--and during her absence, my

superiors ordered my return to my former duties at Antwerp, and for

many years I heard no more of Bridget.

'Not many months ago, as I was passing homewards in the evening, along

one of the streets near St. Jacques, leading into the Meer Straet, I

saw a woman sitting crouched up under the shrine of the Holy Mother of

Sorrows. Her hood was drawn over her head, so that the shadow caused by

the light of the lamp above fell deep over her face; her hands were

clasped round her knees. It was evident that she was some one in

hopeless trouble, and as such it was my duty to stop and speak. I

naturally addressed her first in Flemish, believing her to be one of

the lower class of inhabitants. She shook her head, but did not look

up. Then I tried French, and she replied in that language, but speaking

it so indifferently, that I was sure she was either English or Irish,

and consequently spoke to her in my own native tongue. She recognised

my voice; and, starting up, caught at my robes, dragging me before the

blessed shrine, and throwing herself down, and forcing me, as much by

her evident desire as by her action, to kneel beside her, she

exclaimed:

'"O Holy Virgin! you will never hearken to me again, but hear him; for

you know him of old, that he does your bidding, and strives to heal

broken hearts. Hear him!"

'She turned to me.

'"She will hear you, if you will only pray. She never hears me: she and

all the saints in Heaven cannot hear my prayers, for the Evil One

carries them off, as he carried that first away. O, Father Bernard,

pray for me!"

'I prayed for one in sore distress, of what nature I could not say; but

the Holy Virgin would know. Bridget held me fast, gasping with

eagerness at the sound of my words. When I had ended, I rose, and,

making the sign of the Cross over her, I was going to bless her in the

name of the Holy Church, when she shrank away like some terrified

creature, and said:

'"I am guilty of deadly sin, and am not shriven."

'"Arise, my daughter," said I, "and come with me." And I led the way

into one of the confessionals of St. Jacques.

'She knelt; I listened. No words came. The evil powers had stricken her

dumb, as I heard afterwards they had many a time before, when she

approached confession.

'She was too poor to pay for the necessary forms of exorcism; and

hitherto those priests to whom she had addressed herself were either so

ignorant of the meaning of her broken French, or her Irish-English, or

else esteemed her to be one crazed--as, indeed, her wild and excited

manner might easily have led any one to think--that they had neglected

the sole means of loosening her tongue, so that she might confess her

deadly sin, and after due penance, obtain absolution. But I knew

Bridget of old, and felt that she was a penitent sent to me. I went

through those holy offices appointed by our church for the relief of

such a case. I was the more bound to do this, as I found that she had

come to Antwerp for the sole purpose of discovering me, and making

confession to me. Of the nature of that fearful confession I am

forbidden to speak. Much of it you know; possibly all.

'It now remains for her to free herself from mortal guilt, and to set

others free from the consequences thereof. No prayer, no masses, will

ever do it, although they may strengthen her with that strength by

which alone acts of deepest love and purest self-devotion may be

performed. Her words of passion, and cries for revenge--her unholy

prayers could never reach the ears of the Holy Saints! Other powers

intercepted them, and wrought so that the curses thrown up to Heaven

have fallen on her own flesh and blood; and so, through her very

strength of love, have bruised and crushed her heart. Henceforward her

former self must be buried,--yea, buried quick, if need be,--but never

more to make sign, or utter cry on earth! She has become a Poor Clare,

in order that, by perpetual penance and constant service of others, she

may at length so act as to obtain final absolution and rest for her

soul. Until then, the innocent must suffer. It is to plead for the

innocent that I come to you; not in the name of the witch, Bridget

Fitzgerald, but of the penitent and servant of all men, the Poor Clare,

Sister Magdalen.'

'Sir,' said I, 'I listen to your request with respect; only I may tell

you it is not needed to urge me to do all that I can on behalf of one,

love for whom is part of my very life. If for a time I have absented

myself from her, it is to think and work for her redemption. I, a

member of the English Church--my uncle, a Puritan--pray morning and

night for her by name: the congregations of London, on the next

Sabbath, will pray for one unknown, that she may be set free from the

Powers of Darkness. Moreover, I must tell you, sir, that those evil

ones touch not the great calm of her soul. She lives her own pure and

loving life, unharmed and untainted, though all men fall off from her.

I would I could have her faith!'

My uncle now spoke.

'Nephew,' said he, 'it seems to me that this gentleman, although

professing what I consider an erroneous creed, has touched upon the

right point in exhorting Bridget to acts of love and mercy, whereby to

wipe out her sin of hate and vengeance. Let us strive after our

fashion, by almsgiving and visiting of the needy and fatherless, to

make our prayers acceptable. Meanwhile, I myself will go down into the

north, and take charge of the maiden. I am too old to be daunted by man

or demon. I will bring her to this house as to a home; and let the

Double come if it will! A company of godly divines shall give it the

meeting, and we will try issue.'

The kindly brave old man! But Father Bernard sat on musing.

'All hate,' said he, 'cannot be quenched in her heart; all Christian

forgiveness cannot have entered into her soul, or the demon would have

lost its power. You said, I think, that her grandchild was still

tormented?'

'Still tormented!' I replied, sadly, thinking of Mistress Clarke's last

letter.

He rose to go. We afterwards heard that the occasion of his coming to

London was a secret political mission on behalf of the Jacobites.

Nevertheless, he was a good and a wise man.

Months and months passed away without any change. Lucy entreated my

uncle to leave her where she was,--dreading, as I learnt, lest if she

came, with her fearful companion, to dwell in the same house with me,

that my love could not stand the repeated shocks to which I should be

doomed. And this she thought from no distrust of the strength of my

affection, but from a kind of pitying sympathy for the terror to the

nerves which she observed that the demoniac visitation caused in all.

I was restless and miserable. I devoted myself to good works; but I

performed them from no spirit of love, but solely from the hope of

reward and payment, and so the reward was never granted. At length, I

asked my uncle's leave to travel; and I went forth, a wanderer, with no

distincter end than that of many another wanderer--to get away from

myself. A strange impulse led me to Antwerp, in spite of the wars and

commotions then raging in the Low Countries--or rather, perhaps, the

very craving to become interested in something external, led me into

the thick of the struggle then going on with the Austrians. The cities

of Flanders were all full at that time of civil disturbances and

rebellions, only kept down by force, and the presence of an Austrian

garrison in every place.

I arrived in Antwerp, and made inquiry for Father Bernard. He was away

in the country for a day or two. Then I asked my way to the Convent of

Poor Clares; but, being healthy and prosperous, I could only see the

dim, pent-up, grey walls, shut closely in by narrow streets, in the

lowest part of the town. My landlord told me, that had I been stricken

by some loathsome disease, or in desperate case of any kind, the Poor

Clares would have taken me, and tended me. He spoke of them as an order

of mercy of the strictest kind, dressing scantily in the coarsest

materials, going barefoot, living on what the inhabitants of Antwerp

chose to bestow, and sharing even those fragments and crumbs with the

poor and helpless that swarmed all around; receiving no letters or

communication with the outer world; utterly dead to everything but the

alleviation of suffering. He smiled at my inquiring whether I could get

speech of one of them; and told me that they were even forbidden to

speak for the purposes of begging their daily food; while yet they

lived, and fed others upon what was given in charity.

'But,' exclaimed I, 'supposing all men forgot them! Would they quietly

lie down and die, without making sign of their extremity?'

'If such were their rule, the Poor Clares would willingly do it; but

their founder appointed a remedy for such extreme case as you suggest.

They have a bell--'tis but a small one, as I have heard, and has yet

never been rung in the memory of man: when the Poor Clares have been

without food for twenty-four hours, they may ring this bell, and then

trust to our good people of Antwerp for rushing to the rescue of the

Poor Clares, who have taken such blessed care of us in all our

straits.'

It seemed to me that such rescue would be late in the day; but I did

not say what I thought. I rather turned the conversation, by asking my

landlord if he knew, or had ever heard, anything of a certain Sister

Magdalen.

'Yes,' said he, rather under his breath; 'news will creep out, even

from a convent of Poor Clares. Sister Magdalen is either a great sinner

or a great saint. She does more, as I have heard, than all the other

nuns put together; yet, when last month they would fain have made her

mother-superior, she begged rather that they would place her below all

the rest, and make her the meanest servant of all.'

'You never saw her?' asked I.

'Never,' he replied.

I was weary of waiting for Father Bernard, and yet I lingered in

Antwerp. The political state of things became worse than ever,

increased to its height by the scarcity of food consequent on many

deficient harvests. I saw groups of fierce, squalid men, at every

corner of the street, glaring out with wolfish eyes at my sleek skin

and handsome clothes.

At last Father Bernard returned. We had a long conversation, in which

he told me that, curiously enough, Mr. Gisborne, Lucy's father, was

serving in one of the Austrian regiments, then in garrison at Antwerp.

I asked Father Bernard if he would make us acquainted; which he

consented to do. But, a day or two afterwards, he told me that, on

hearing my name, Mr. Gisborne had declined responding to any advances

on my part, saying he had abjured his country, and hated his

countrymen.

Probably he recollected my name in connection with that of his daughter

Lucy. Anyhow, it was clear enough that I had no chance of making his

acquaintance. Father Bernard confirmed me in my suspicions of the

hidden fermentation, for some coming evil, working among the 'blouses'

of Antwerp, and he would fain have had me depart from out the city; but

I rather craved the excitement of danger, and stubbornly refused to

leave.

One day, when I was walking with him in the Place Verte, he bowed to an

Austrian officer, who was crossing towards the cathedral.

'That is Mr. Gisborne,' said he, as soon as the gentleman was past.

I turned to look at the tall, slight figure of the officer. He carried

himself in a stately manner, although he was past middle age, and from

his years, might have had some excuse for a slight stoop. As I looked

at the man, he turned round, his eyes met mine, and I saw his face.

Deeply lined, sallow, and scathed was that countenance; scarred by

passion as well as by the fortunes of war. 'Twas but a moment our eyes

met. We each turned round, and went on our separate way.

But his whole appearance was not one to be easily forgotten; the

thorough appointment of the dress, and evident thought bestowed on it,

made but an incongruous whole with the dark, gloomy expression of his

countenance. Because he was Lucy's father, I sought instinctively to

meet him everywhere. At last he must have become aware of my

pertinacity, for he gave me a haughty scowl whenever I passed him. In

one of these encounters, however, I chanced to be of some service to

him. He was turning the corner of a street, and came suddenly on one of

the groups of discontented Flemings of whom I have spoken. Some words

were exchanged, when my gentleman out with his sword, and with a slight

but skilful cut drew blood from one of those who had insulted him, as

he fancied, though I was too far off to hear the words. They would all

have fallen upon him had I not rushed forwards and raised the cry, then

well known in Antwerp, of rally, to the Austrian soldiers who were

perpetually patrolling the streets, and who came in numbers to the

rescue. I think that neither Mr. Gisborne nor the mutinous group of

plebeians owed me much gratitude for my interference. He had planted

himself against a wall, in a skilful attitude of fence, ready with his

bright glancing rapier to do battle with all the heavy, fierce, unarmed

men, some six or seven in number. But when his own soldiers came up, he

sheathed his sword; and, giving some careless word of command, sent

them away again, and continued his saunter all alone down the street,

the workmen snarling in his rear, and more than half-inclined to fall

on me for my cry for rescue. I cared not if they did, my life seemed so

dreary a burden just then; and, perhaps, it was this daring loitering

among them that prevented their attacking me. Instead, they suffered me

to fall into conversation with them; and I heard some of their

grievances. Sore and heavy to be borne were they, and no wonder the

sufferers were savage and desperate.

The man whom Gisborne had wounded across his face would fain have got

out of me the name of his aggressor, but I refused to tell it. Another

of the group heard his inquiry, and made answer:

'I know the man. He is one Gisborne, aide-de-camp to the

General-Commandant. I know him well.'

He began to tell some story in connection with Gisborne in a low and

muttering voice; and while he was relating a tale, which I saw excited

their evil blood, and which they evidently wished me not to hear, I

sauntered away and back to my lodgings.

That night Antwerp was in open revolt. The inhabitants rose in

rebellion against their Austrian masters. The Austrians, holding the

gates of the city, remained at first pretty quiet in the citadel; only,

from time to time, the boom of a great cannon swept sullenly over the

town. But, if they expected the disturbance to die away, and spend

itself in a few hours' fury, they were mistaken. In a day or two, the

rioters held possession of the principal municipal buildings. Then the

Austrians poured forth in bright flaming array, calm and smiling, as

they marched to the posts assigned, as if the fierce mob were no more

to them than the swarms of buzzing summer flies. Their practised

manoeuvres, their well-aimed shot, told with terrible effect; but in

the place of one slain rioter, three sprang up of his blood to avenge

his loss. But a deadly foe, a ghastly ally of the Austrians, was at

work. Food, scarce and dear for months, was now hardly to be obtained

at any price. Desperate efforts were being made to bring provisions

into the city, for the rioters had friends without. Close to the city

port nearest to the Scheldt, a great struggle took place. I was there,

helping the rioters, whose cause I had adopted. We had a savage

encounter with the Austrians. Numbers fell on both sides; I saw them

lie bleeding for a moment; then a volley of smoke obscured them; and

when it cleared away, they were dead--trampled upon or smothered,

pressed down and hidden by the freshly-wounded whom those last guns had

brought low. And then a grey-robed and grey-veiled figure came right

across the flashing guns, and stooped over some one, whose life-blood

was ebbing away; sometimes it was to give him drink from cans which

they carried slung at their sides, sometimes I saw the cross held above

a dying man, and rapid prayers were being uttered, unheard by men in

that hellish din and clangour, but listened to by One above. I saw all

this as in a dream: the reality of that stern time was battle and

carnage. But I knew that these grey figures, their bare feet all wet

with blood, and their faces hidden by their veils, were the Poor

Clares--sent forth now because dire agony was abroad and imminent

danger at hand. Therefore, they left their cloistered shelter, and came

into that thick and evil mêlée.

Close to me--driven past me by the struggle of many fighters--came the

Antwerp burgess with the scarce-healed scar upon his face; and in an

instant more, he was thrown by the press upon the Austrian officer

Gisborne, and ere either had recovered the shock, the burgess had

recognised his opponent.

'Ha! the Englishman Gisborne!' he cried, and threw himself upon him

with redoubled fury. He had struck him hard--the Englishman was down;

when out of the smoke came a dark-grey figure, and threw herself right

under the uplifted flashing sword. The burgess's arm stood arrested.

Neither Austrians nor Anversois willingly harmed the Poor Clares.

'Leave him to me!' said a low stern voice. 'He is mine enemy--mine for

many years.'

Those words were the last I heard. I myself was struck down by a

bullet. I remember nothing more for days. When I came to myself, I was

at the extremity of weakness, and was craving for food to recruit my

strength. My landlord sat watching me. He, too, looked pinched and

shrunken; he had heard of my wounded state, and sought me out. Yes! the

struggle still continued, but the famine was sore; and some, he had

heard, had died for lack of food. The tears stood in his eyes as he

spoke. But soon he shook off his weakness, and his natural cheerfulness

returned. Father Bernard had been to see me--no one else. (Who should,

indeed?) Father Bernard would come back that afternoon--he had

promised. But Father Bernard never came, although I was up and dressed,

and looking eagerly for him.

My landlord brought me a meal which he had cooked himself: of what it

was composed he would not say, but it was most excellent, and with

every mouthful I seemed to gain strength. The good man sat looking at

my evident enjoyment with a happy smile of sympathy; but, as my

appetite became satisfied, I began to detect a certain wistfulness in

his eyes, as if craving for the food I had so nearly devoured--for,

indeed, at that time I was hardly aware of the extent of the famine.

Suddenly, there was a sound of many rushing feet past our window. My

landlord opened one of the sides of it, the better to learn what was

going on. Then we heard a faint, cracked, tinkling bell, coming shrill

upon clear and distinct from all other sounds. 'Holy Mother!' exclaimed

my landlord, 'the Poor Clares!'

He snatched up the fragments of my meal, and crammed them into my

hands, bidding me follow. Down-stairs he ran, clutching at more food,

as the women of his house eagerly held it out to him; and in a moment

we were in the street, moving along with the great current, all tending

towards the Convent of the Poor Clares. And still, as if piercing our

ears with its inarticulate cry, came the shrill tinkle of the bell. In

that strange crowd were old men trembling and sobbing, as they carried

their little pittance of food; women with the tears running down their

cheeks, who had snatched up what provisions they had in the vessels in

which they stood, so that the burden of these was in many cases much

greater than that which they contained; children, with flushed faces,

grasping tight the morsel of bitten cake or bread, in their eagerness

to carry it safe to the help of the Poor Clares; strong men--yea, both

Anversois and Austrians--pressing onwards with set teeth, and no word

spoken; and over all, and through all, came that sharp tinkle--that cry

for help in extremity.

We met the first torrent of people returning with blanched and piteous

faces: they were issuing out of the convent to make way for the

offerings of others. 'Haste, haste!' said they.

'A Poor Clare is dying! A Poor Clare is dead for hunger! God forgive

us, and our city!'

We pressed on. The stream bore us along where it would. We were carried

through refectories, bare and crumbless; into cells over whose doors

the conventual name of the occupant was written. Thus it was that I,

with others, was forced into Sister Magdalen's cell. On her couch lay

Gisborne, pale unto death, but not dead. By his side was a cup of

water, and a small morsel of mouldy bread, which he had pushed out of

his reach, and could not move to obtain. Over against his bed were

these words, copied in the English version: 'Therefore, if thine enemy

hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink.'

Some of us gave him of our food, and left him eating greedily, like

some famished wild animal. For now it was no longer the sharp tinkle,

but that one solemn toll, which in all Christian countries tells of the

passing of the spirit out of earthly life into eternity; and again a

murmur gathered and grew, as of many people speaking with awed breath,

'A Poor Clare is dying! a Poor Clare is dead!'

Borne along once more by the motion of the crowd, we were carried into

the chapel belonging to the Poor Clares. On a bier before the high

altar, lay a woman--lay sister Magdalen--lay Bridget Fitzgerald. By her

side stood Father Bernard, in his robes of office, and holding the

crucifix on high while he pronounced the solemn absolution of the

Church, as to one who had newly confessed herself of deadly sin. I

pushed on with passionate force, till I stood close to the dying woman,

as she received extreme unction amid the breathless and awed hush of

the multitude around. Her eyes were glazing, her limbs were stiffening;

but when the rite was over and finished, she raised her gaunt figure

slowly up, and her eyes brightened to a strange intensity of joy, as,

with the gesture of her finger and the trance-like gleam of her eye,

she seemed like one who watched the disappearance of some loathed and

fearful creature.

'She is freed from the curse!' said she, as she fell back dead.

* * * * *

Now, of all our party who had first listened to my Lady Ludlow, Mr.

Preston was the only one who had not told us something, either of

information, tradition, history, or legend. We naturally turned to him;

but we did not like asking him directly for his contribution, for he

was a grave, reserved, and silent man.

He understood us, however, and, rousing himself as it were, he said:

'I know you wish me to tell you, in my turn, of something which I have

learnt or heard during my life. I could tell you something of my own

life, and of a life dearer still to my memory; but I have shrunk from

narrating anything so purely personal. Yet, shrink as I will, no other

but those sad recollections will present themselves to my mind. I call

them sad when I think of the end of it all. However I am not going to

moralize. If my dear brother's life and death does not speak for

itself, no words of mine will teach you what may be learnt from it.'

LOIS THE WITCH

Chapter 1

In the year 1691, Lois Barclay stood on a little wooden pier, steadying

herself on the stable land, in much the same manner as, eight or nine

weeks ago, she had tried to steady herself on the deck of the rocking

ship which had carried her across from Old to New England. It seemed as

strange now to be on solid earth as it had been, not long ago, to be

rocked by the sea, both by day and by night; and the aspect of the land

was equally strange. The forests which showed in the distance all

round, and which, in truth, were not very far from the wooden houses

forming the town of Boston, were of different shades of green, and

different, too, in shape of outline to those which Lois Barclay knew

well in her old home in Warwickshire. Her heart sank a little as she

stood alone, waiting for the captain of the good ship Redemption, the

kind rough old sailor, who was her only known friend in this unknown

continent. Captain Holdernesse was busy, however, as she saw, and it

would probably be some time before he would be ready to attend, to her;

so Lois sat down on one of the casks that lay about, and wrapped her

grey duffle cloak tight around her, and sheltered herself under her

hood, as well as might be, from the piercing wind, which seemed to

follow those whom it had tyrannized over at sea with a dogged wish of

still tormenting them on land. Very patiently did Lois sit there,

although she was weary, and shivering with cold; for the day was severe

for May, and the Redemption, with store of necessaries and comforts for

the Puritan colonists of New England, was the earliest ship that had

ventured across the seas.

How could Lois help thinking of the past, and speculating on the

future, as she sat on Boston pier, at this breathing-time of her life?

In the dim sea-mist which she gazed upon with aching eyes (filled,

against her will, with tears, from time to time), there rose the little

village church of Barford (not three miles from Warwick--you may see it

yet), where her father had preached ever since 1661, long before she

was born. He and her mother both lay dead in Barford churchyard; and

the old low grey church could hardly come before her vision without her

seeing the old parsonage too, the cottage covered with Austrian roses,

and yellow jessamine, where she had been born, sole child of parents

already long past the prime of youth. She saw the path, not a hundred

yards long, from the parsonage to the vestry door: that path which her

father trod daily; for the vestry was his study, and the sanctum, where

he pored over the ponderous tomes of the Father, and compared their

precepts with those of the authorities of the Anglican Church of that

day--the day of the later Stuarts; for Barford Parsonage at that time

scarcely exceeded in size and dignity the cottages by which it was

surrounded: it only contained three rooms on a floor, and was but two

stories high. On the first, or ground floor, were the parlour, kitchen,

and back or working kitchen; up-stairs, Mr. and Mrs. Barclay's room,

that belonging to Lois, and the maid-servant's room. If a guest came,

Lois left her own chamber, and shared old Clemence's bed. But those

days were over. Never more should Lois see father or mother on earth;

they slept, calm and still, in Barford churchyard, careless of what

became of their orphan child, as far as earthly manifestations of care

or love went. And Clemence lay there too, bound down in her grassy bed

by withes of the briar-rose, which Lois had trained over those three

precious graves before leaving England for ever.

There were some who would fain have kept her there; one who swore in

his heart a great oath unto the Lord that he would seek her sooner or

later, if she was still upon the earth. But he was the rich heir and

only son of the Miller Lucy, whose mill stood by the Avon-side in the

grassy Barford meadows, and his father looked higher for him than the

penniless daughter of Parson Barclay (so low were clergymen esteemed in

those days!); and the very suspicion of Hugh Lucy's attachment to Lois

Barclay made his parents think it more prudent not to offer the orphan

a home, although none other of the parishioners had the means, even if

they had the will, to do so.

So Lois swallowed her tears down till the time came for crying, and

acted upon her mother's words:

'Lois, thy father is dead of this terrible fever, and I am dying. Nay,

it is so, though I am easier from pain for these few hours, the Lord be

praised! The cruel men of the Commonwealth have left thee very

friendless. Thy father's only brother was shot down at Edgehill. I,

too, have a brother, though thou hast never heard me speak of him, for

he was a schismatic; and thy father and he had words, and he left for

that new country beyond the seas, without ever saying farewell to us.

But Ralph was a kind lad until he took up these new-fangled notions,

and for the old days' sake he will take thee in, and love thee as a

child, and place thee among his children. Blood is thicker than water.

Write to him as soon as I am gone--for Lois, I am going--and I bless

the Lord that has letten me join my husband again so soon.' Such was

the selfishness of conjugal love; she thought little of Lois's

desolation in comparison with her rejoicing over her speedy reunion

with her dead husband! 'Write to thine uncle, Ralph Hickson, Salem, New

England (put it down, child, on thy tablets), and say that I, Henrietta

Barclay, charge him, for the sake of all he holds dear in heaven or on

earth,--for his salvation's sake, as well as for the sake of the old

home at Lester-bridge,--for the sake of the father and mother that gave

us birth, as well as for the sake of the six little children who lie

dead between him and me,--that he take thee into his home as if thou

wert his own flesh and blood, as indeed thou art. He has a wife and

children of his own, and no one need fear having thee, my Lois, my

darling, my baby, among his household. Oh, Lois, would that thou wert

dying with me! The thought of thee makes death sore!' Lois comforted

her mother more than herself, poor child, by promises to obey her dying

wishes to the letter, and by expressing hopes she dared not feel of her

uncle's kindness.

'Promise me'--the dying woman's breath came harder and harder--'that

thou wilt go at once. The money our goods will bring--the letter thy

father wrote to Captain Holdernesse, his old schoolfellow--thou knowest

all I would say--my Lois, God bless thee!'

Solemnly did Lois promise; strictly she kept her word. It was all the

more easy, for Hugh Lucy met her, and told her, in one great burst of

love, of his passionate attachment, his vehement struggles with his

father, his impotence at present, his hope and resolves for the future.

And, intermingled with all this, came such outrageous threats and

expressions of uncontrolled vehemence, that Lois felt that in Barford

she must not linger to be a cause of desperate quarrel between father

and son, while her absence might soften down matters, so that either

the rich old miller might relent, or--and her heart ached to think of

the other possibility--Hugh's love might cool, and the dear play-fellow

of her childhood learn to forget. If not--if Hugh were to be trusted in

one tithe of what he said--God might permit him to fulfil his resolve

of coming to seek her out before many years were over. It was all in

God's hands, and that was best, thought Lois Barclay.

She was roused out of her trance of recollections by Captain

Holdernesse, who, having done all that was necessary in the way of

orders and directions to his mate, now came up to her, and, praising

her for her quiet patience, told her that he would now take her to the

Widow Smith's, a decent kind of house, where he and many other sailors

of the better order were in the habit of lodging, during their stay on

the New England shores. Widow Smith, he said, had a parlour for herself

and her daughters, in which Lois might sit, while he went about the

business that, as he had told her, would detain him in Boston for a day

or two, before he could accompany her to her uncle's at Salem. All this

had been to a certain degree arranged on ship-board; but Captain

Holdernesse, for want of anything else that he could think of to talk

about, recapitulated it as he and Lois walked along. It was his way of

showing sympathy with the emotion that made her grey eyes full of

tears, as she started up from the pier at the sound of his voice. In

his heart he said, 'Poor wench! poor wench! it's a strange land to her,

and they are all strange folks, and, I reckon, she will be feeling

desolate. I'll try and cheer her up.' So he talked on about hard facts,

connected with the life that lay before her, until they reached Widow

Smith's; and perhaps Lois was more brightened by this style of

conversation, and the new ideas it presented to her, than she would

have been by the tenderest woman's sympathy.

'They are a queer set, these New Englanders,' said Captain Holdernesse.

'They are rare chaps for praying; down on their knees at every turn of

their life. Folk are none so busy in a new country, else they would

have to pray like me, with a "Yo-hoy!" on each side of my prayers, and

a rope cutting like fire through my hand. Yon pilot was for calling us

all to thanksgiving for a good voyage, and lucky escape from the

pirates; but I said I always put up my thanks on dry land, after I had

got my ship into harbour. The French colonists, too, are vowing

vengeance for the expedition against Canada, and the people here are

raging like heathens--at least, as like as godly folk can be--for the

loss of their charter. All that is the news the pilot told me; for, for

all he wanted us to be thanksgiving instead of casting the lead, he was

as down in the mouth as could be about the state of the country. But

here we are at Widow Smith's! Now, cheer up, and show the godly a

pretty smiling Warwickshire lass!'

Anybody would have smiled at Widow Smith's greeting. She was a comely,

motherly woman, dressed in the primmest fashion in vogue twenty years

before, in England, among the class to which she belonged. But,

somehow, her pleasant face gave the lie to her dress; were it as brown

and sober-coloured as could be, folk remembered it bright and cheerful,

because it was a part of Widow Smith herself.

She kissed Lois on both cheeks, before she rightly understood who the

stranger maiden was, only because she was a stranger, and looked sad

and forlorn; and then she kissed her again, because Captain Holdernesse

commended her to the widow's good offices. And so she led Lois by the

hand into her rough, substantial log-house, over the door of which hung

a great bough of a tree, by way of sign of entertainment for man and

horse. Yet not all men were received by Widow Smith. To some she could

be as cold and reserved as need be, deaf to all inquiries save

one--where else they could find accommodation? To this question she

would give a ready answer, and speed the unwelcome guest on his way.

Widow Smith was guided in these matters by instinct: one glance at a

man's face told her whether or not she chose to have him as an inmate

of the same house as her daughters; and her promptness of decision in

these matters gave her manner a kind of authority which no one liked to

disobey, especially as she had stalwart neighbours within call to back

her, if her assumed deafness in the first instance, and her voice and

gesture in the second, were not enough to give the would-be guest his

dismissal. Widow Smith chose her customers merely by their physical

aspect; not one whit with regard to their apparent worldly

circumstances. Those who had been staying at her house once, always

came again, for she had the knack of making every one beneath her roof

comfortable and at his ease. Her daughters, Prudence and Hester, had

somewhat of their mother's gifts, but not in such perfection. They

reasoned a little upon a stranger's appearance, instead of knowing at

the first moment whether they liked him or no; they noticed the

indications of his clothes, the quality and cut thereof, as telling

somewhat of his station in society; they were more reserved, they

hesitated more than their mother; they had not her prompt authority,

her happy power. Their bread was not so light, their cream went

sometimes to sleep when it should have been turning into butter, their

hams were not always 'just like the hams of the old country,' as their

mother's were invariably pronounced to be; yet they were good, orderly,

kindly girls, and rose and greeted Lois with a friendly shake of the

hand, as their mother, with her arm round the stranger's waist, led her

into the private room which she called her parlour. The aspect of this

room was strange in the English girl's eyes. The logs of which the

house was built, showed here and there through the mud plaster,

although before both plaster and logs were hung the skins of many

curious animals,--skins presented to the widow by many a trader of her

acquaintance, just as her sailor guests brought her another description

of gift--shells, strings of wampum-beads, sea-birds' eggs, and presents

from the old country. The room was more like a small museum of natural

history of these days than a parlour; and it had a strange, peculiar,

but not unpleasant smell about it, neutralized in some degree by the

smoke from the enormous trunk of pinewood which smouldered on the

hearth.

The instant their mother told them that Captain Holdernesse was in the

outer room, the girls began putting away their spinning-wheel and

knitting-needles, and preparing for a meal of some kind; what meal,

Lois, sitting there and unconsciously watching, could hardly tell.

First, dough was set to rise for cakes; then came out of a corner

cupboard--a present from England--an enormous square bottle of a

cordial called Golden Wasser; next, a mill for grinding chocolate--a

rare unusual treat anywhere at that time; then a great Cheshire cheese.

Three venison steaks were cut ready for broiling, fat cold pork sliced

up and treacle poured over it, a great pie something like a mince-pie,

but which the daughters spoke of with honour as the 'punken-pie,' fresh

and salt fish brandered, oysters cooked in various ways. Lois wondered

where would be the end of the provisions for hospitably receiving the

strangers from the old country. At length everything was placed on the

table, the hot food smoking; but all was cool, not to say cold, before

Elder Hawkins (an old neighbour of much repute and standing, who had

been invited in by Widow Smith to hear the news) had finished his

grace, into which was embodied thanksgivings for the past and prayers

for the future lives of every individual present, adapted to their

several cases, as far as the elder could guess at them from

appearances. This grace might not have ended so soon as it did, had it

not been for the somewhat impatient drumming of his knife-handle on the

table with which Captain Holdernesse accompanied the latter half of the

elder's words.

When they first sat down to their meal, all were too hungry for much

talking; but as their appetites diminished their curiosity increased,

and there was much to be told and heard on both sides. With all the

English intelligence Lois was, of course, well acquainted; but she

listened with natural attention to all that was said about the new

country, and the new people among whom she had come to live. Her father

had been a Jacobite, as the adherents of the Stuarts were beginning at

this time to be called. His father, again, had been a follower of

Archbishop Laud; so Lois had hitherto heard little of the conversation,

and seen little of the ways of the Puritans. Elder Hawkins was one of

the strictest of the strict, and evidently his presence kept the two

daughters of the house considerably in awe. But the widow herself was a

privileged person; her known goodness of heart (the effects of which

had been experienced by many) gave her the liberty of speech which was

tacitly denied to many, under penalty of being esteemed ungodly if they

infringed certain conventional limits. And Captain Holdernesse and his

mate spoke out their minds, let who would be present. So that on this

first landing in New England, Lois was, as it were, gently let down

into the midst of the Puritan peculiarities, and yet they were

sufficient to make her feel very lonely and strange.

The first subject of conversation was the present state of the

colony--Lois soon found out that, although at the beginning she was not

a little perplexed by the frequent reference to names of places which

she naturally associated with the old country. Widow Smith was

speaking: 'In the county of Essex the folk are ordered to keep four

scouts, or companies of minute-men; six persons in each company; to be

on the look-out for the wild Indians, who are for ever stirring about

in the woods, stealthy brutes as they are! I am sure, I got such a

fright the first harvest-time after I came over to New England, I go on

dreaming, now near twenty years after Lothrop's business, of painted

Indians, with their shaven scalps and their war-streaks, lurking behind

the trees, and coming nearer and nearer with their noiseless steps.'

'Yes,' broke in one of her daughters; 'and, mother, don't you remember

how Hannah Benson told us how her husband had cut down every tree near

his house at Deerbrook, in order that no one might come near him, under

cover; and how one evening she was a-sitting in the twilight, when all

her family were gone to bed, and her husband gone off to Plymouth on

business, and she saw a log of wood, just like a trunk of a felled

tree, lying in the shadow, and thought nothing of it, till, on looking

again a while after, she fancied it was come a bit nearer to the house,

and how her heart turned sick with fright, and how she dared not stir

at first, but shut her eyes while she counted a hundred, and looked

again, and the shadow was deeper, but she could see that the log was

nearer; so she ran in and bolted the door, and went up to where her

eldest lad lay. It was Elijah, and he was but sixteen then; but he rose

up at his mother's words, and took his father's long duck-gun down, and

he tried the loading, and spoke for the first time to put up a prayer

that God would give his aim good guidance, and went to a window that

gave a view upon the side where the log lay, and fired, and no one

dared to look what came of it, but all the household read the

Scriptures, and prayed the whole night long, till morning came and

showed a long stream of blood lying on the grass close by the log,

which the full sunlight showed to be no log at all, but just a Red

Indian covered with bark, and painted most skilfully, with his

war-knife by his side.'

All were breathless with listening, though to most the story, or such

like it, were familiar. Then another took up the tale of horror:

'And the pirates have been down at Marblehead since you were here,

Captain Holdernesse. 'Twas only the last winter they landed,--French

Papist pirates; and the people kept close within their houses, for they

knew not what would come of it; and they dragged folk ashore. There was

one woman among those folk--prisoners from some vessel, doubtless--and

the pirates took them by force to the inland marsh; and the Marblehead

folk kept still and quiet, every gun loaded, and every ear on the

watch, for who knew but what the wild sea-robbers might take a turn on

land next; and, in the dead of the night, they heard a woman's loud and

pitiful outcry from the marsh, 'Lord Jesu! have mercy on me! Save me

from the power of man, O Lord Jesu!' And the blood of all who heard the

cry ran cold with terror, till old Nance Hickson, who had been

stone-deaf and bedridden for years, stood up in the midst of the folk

all gathered together in her grandson's house, and said, that as they,

the dwellers in Marblehead, had not had brave hearts or faith enough to

go and succour the helpless, that cry of a dying woman should be in

their ears, and in their children's ears, till the end of the world.

And Nance dropped down dead as soon as she had made an end of speaking,

and the pirates set sail from Marblehead at morning dawn; but the folk

there hear the cry still, shrill and pitiful, from the waste marshes,

"Lord Jesu! have mercy on me! Save me from the power of man, O Lord

Jesu!"'

'And by token,' said Elder Hawkins's deep bass voice, speaking with the

strong nasal twang of the Puritans (who, says Butler,

"Blasphemed custard through the nose"),

'godly Mr. Noyes ordained a fast at Marblehead, and preached a

soul-stirring discourse on the words; "Inasmuch as ye did it not unto

one of the least of these, my brethren, ye did it not unto me." But it

has been borne in upon me at times, whether the whole vision of the

pirates and the cry of the woman was not a device of Satan's to sift

the Marblehead folk, and see what fruit their doctrine bore, and so to

condemn them in the sight of the Lord. If it were so, the enemy had a

great triumph, for assuredly it was no part of Christian men to leave a

helpless woman unaided in her sore distress.'

'But, Elder,' said Widow Smith, 'it was no vision; they were real

living men who went ashore, men who broke down branches and left their

footmarks on the ground.'

'As for that matter, Satan hath many powers, and if it be the day when

he is permitted to go about like a roaring lion, he will not stick at

trifles, but make his work complete. I tell you, many men are spiritual

enemies in visible forms, permitted to roam about the waste places of

the earth. I myself believe that these Red Indians are indeed the evil

creatures of whom we read in Holy Scripture; and there is no doubt that

they are in league with those abominable Papists, the French people in

Canada. I have heard tell, that the French pay the Indians so much gold

for every dozen scalps off Englishmen's heads.'

'Pretty cheerful talk this,' said Captain Holdernesse to Lois,

perceiving her blanched cheek and terror-stricken mien. 'Thou art

thinking that thou hadst better have stayed at Barford, I'll answer for

it, wench. But the devil is not so black as he is painted.'

'Ho! there again!' said Elder Hawkins. 'The devil is painted, it hath

been said so from old times; and are not these Indians painted, even

like unto their father?'

'But is it all true?' asked Lois, aside, of Captain Holdernesse,

letting the elder hold forth unheeded by her, though listened to,

however, with the utmost reverence by the two daughters of the house.

'My wench,' said the old sailor, 'thou hast come to a country where

there are many perils, both from land and from sea. The Indians hate

the white men. Whether other white men' (meaning the French away to the

north) 'have hounded on the savages, or whether the English have taken

their lands and hunting-grounds without due recompense, and so raised

the cruel vengeance of the wild creatures--who knows? But it is true

that it is not safe to go far into the woods, for fear of the lurking

painted savages; nor has it been safe to build a dwelling far from a

settlement; and it takes a brave heart to make a journey from one town

to another, and folk do say the Indian creatures rise up out of the

very ground to waylay the English; and then offers affirm they are all

in league with Satan to affright the Christians out of the heathen

country over which he has reigned so long. Then, again, the seashore is

infested by pirates, the scum of all nations: they land, and plunder,

and ravage, and burn, and destroy. Folk get affrighted of the real

dangers, and in their fright imagine, perchance, dangers that are not.

But who knows? Holy Scripture speaks of witches and wizards, and of the

power of the Evil One in desert places; and even in the old country we

have heard tell of those who have sold their souls for ever for the

little power they get for a few years on earth.'

By this time the whole table was silent, listening to the captain; it

was just one of those chance silences that sometimes occur, without any

apparent reason, and often without any apparent consequence. But all

present had reason, before many months had-passed over, to remember the

words which Lois spoke in answer, although her voice was low, and she

only thought, in the interest of the moment, of being heard by her old

friend the captain.

'They are fearful creatures, the witches! and yet I am sorry for the

poor old women, whilst I dread them. We had one in Barford, when I was

a little child. No one knew whence she came, but she settled herself

down in a mud hut by the common side; and there she lived, she and her

cat.' (At the mention of the cat, Elder Hawkins shook his head long and

gloomily.) 'No one knew how she lived, if it were not on nettles and

scraps of oatmeal and such-like food given her more for fear than for

pity. She went double, always talking and muttering to herself. Folk

said she snared birds and rabbits, in the thicket that came down to her

hovel. How it came to pass I cannot say, but many a one fell sick in

the village, and much cattle died one spring, when I was near four

years old. I never heard much about it, for my father said it was ill

talking about such things; I only know I got a sick fright one

afternoon, when the maid had gone out for milk and had taken me with

her, and we were passing a meadow where the Avon, circling, makes a

deep round pool, and there was a crowd of folk, all still--and a still,

breathless crowd makes the heart beat worse than a shouting, noisy one.

They were all gazing towards the water, and the maid held me up in her

arms to see the sight above the shoulders of the people; and I saw old

Hannah in the water, her grey hair all streaming down her shoulders,

and her face bloody and black with the stones and the mud they had been

throwing at her, and her cat tied round her neck. I hid my face, I

know, as soon as I saw the fearsome sight, for her eyes met mine as

they were glaring with fury--poor, helpless, baited creature!--and she

caught the sight of me, and cried out, "Parson's wench, parson's wench,

yonder, in thy nurse's arms, thy dad hath never tried for to save me,

and none shall save thee when thou art brought up for a witch." Oh! the

words rang in my ears, when I was dropping asleep, for years after. I

used to dream that I was in that pond, all men hating me with their

eyes because I was a witch; and, at times, her black cat used to seem

living again, and say over those dreadful words.'

Lois stopped: the two daughters looked at her excitement with a kind of

shrinking surprise, for the tears were in her eyes. Elder Hawkins shook

his head, and muttered texts from Scripture; but cheerful Widow Smith,

not liking the gloomy turn of the conversation, tried to give it a

lighter cast by saying, 'And I don't doubt but what the parson's bonny

lass has bewitched many a one since, with her dimples and her pleasant

ways--eh, Captain Holdernesse? It's you must tell us tales of this

young lass' doings in England.'

'Ay, ay,' said the captain, 'there's one under her charms in

Warwickshire who will never get the better of it, I'm thinking.'

Elder Hawkins rose to speak; he stood leaning on his hands, which were

placed on the table: 'Brethren,' said he, 'I must upbraid you if ye

speak lightly; charms and witchcraft are evil things. I trust this

maiden hath had nothing to do with them, even in thought. But my mind

misgives me at her story. The hellish witch might have power from Satan

to infect her mind, she being yet a child, with the deadly sin. Instead

of vain talking, I call upon you all to join with me in prayer for this

stranger in our land, that her heart may be purged from all iniquity.

Let us pray.'

'Come, there's no harm in that,' said the captain; 'but, Elder Hawkins,

when you are at work, just pray for us all, for I am afeard there be

some of us need purging from iniquity a good deal more than Lois

Barclay, and a prayer for a man never does mischief.'

Captain Holdernesse had business in Boston which detained him there for

a couple of days, and during that time Lois remained with the Widow

Smith, seeing what was to be seen of the new land that contained her

future home. The letter of her dying mother was sent off to Salem,

meanwhile, by a lad going thither, in order to prepare her Uncle Ralph

Hickson for his niece's coming, as soon as Captain Holdernesse could

find leisure to take her; for he considered her given into his own

personal charge, until he could consign her to her uncle's care. When

the time came for going to Salem, Lois felt very sad at leaving the

kindly woman under whose roof she had been staying, and looked back as

long as she could see anything of Widow Smith's dwelling. She was

packed into a rough kind of country cart, which just held her and

Captain Holdernesse, beside the driver. There was a basket of

provisions under their feet, and behind them hung a bag of provender

for the horse; for it was a good day's journey to Salem, and the road

was reputed so dangerous that it was ill tarrying a minute longer than

necessary for refreshment. English roads were bad enough at that period

and for long after, but in America the way was simply the cleared

ground of the forest; the stumps of the felled trees still remaining in

the direct line, forming obstacles, which it required the most careful

driving to avoid; and in the hollows, where the ground was swampy, the

pulpy nature of it was obviated by logs of wood laid across the boggy

part. The deep green forest, tangled into heavy darkness even thus

early in the year, came within a few yards of the road all the way,

though efforts were regularly made by the inhabitants of the

neighbouring settlements to keep a certain space clear on each side,

for fear of the lurking Indians, who might otherwise come upon them

unawares. The cries of strange birds, the unwonted colour of some of

them, all suggested to the imaginative or unaccustomed traveller the

idea of war-whoops and painted deadly enemies. But at last they drew

near to Salem, which rivalled Boston in size in those days, and boasted

the name of one or two streets, although to an English eye they looked

rather more like irregularly built houses, clustered round the

meeting-house, or rather one of the meeting-houses, for a second was in

process of building. The whole place was surrounded with two circles of

stockades; between the two were the gardens and grazing ground for

those who dreaded their cattle straying into the woods, and the

consequent danger of reclaiming them.

The lad who drove them flogged his spent horse into a trot, as they

went through Salem to Ralph Hickson's house. It was evening, the

leisure time for the inhabitants, and their children were at play

before the houses. Lois was struck by the beauty of one wee toddling

child, and turned to look after it; it caught its little foot in a

stump of wood, and fell with a cry that brought the mother out in

affright. As she ran out, her eye caught Lois's anxious gaze, although

the noise of the heavy wheels drowned the sound of her words of inquiry

as to the nature of the hurt the child had received. Nor had Lois time

to think long upon the matter, for the instant after, the horse was

pulled up at the door of a good, square, substantial wooden house,

plastered over into a creamy white, perhaps as handsome a house as any

in Salem; and there she was told by the driver that her uncle, Ralph

Hickson, lived. In the flurry of the moment she did not notice, but

Captain Holdernesse did, that no one came out at the unwonted sound of

wheels, to receive and welcome her. She was lifted down by the old

sailor, and led into a large room, almost like the hall of some English

manor-house as to size. A tall, gaunt young man of three or four and

twenty, sat on a bench by one of the windows, reading a great folio by

the fading light of day. He did not rise when they came in, but looked

at them with surprise, no gleam of intelligence coming into his stern,

dark face. There was no woman in the house-place. Captain Holdernesse

paused a moment, and then said:

'Is this house Ralph Hickson's?'

'It is,' said the young man, in a slow, deep voice. But he added no

word further.

'This is his niece, Lois Barclay,' said the captain, taking the girl's

arm, and pushing her forwards. The young man looked at her steadily and

gravely for a minute; then rose, and carefully marking the page in the

folio which hitherto had lain open upon his knee, said, still in the

same heavy, indifferent manner, 'I will call my mother, she will know.'

He opened a door which looked into a warm bright kitchen, ruddy with

the light of the fire over which three women were apparently engaged

in cooking something, while a fourth, an old Indian woman, of a

greenish-brown colour, shrivelled up and bent with apparent age, moved

backwards and forwards, evidently fetching the others the articles they

required.

'Mother,' said the young man; and having arrested her attention, he

pointed over his shoulder to the newly-arrived strangers, and returned

to the study of his book, from time to time, however, furtively

examining Lois from beneath his dark shaggy eyebrows.

A tall, largely made woman, past middle life, came in from the kitchen,

and stood reconnoitring the strangers.

Captain Holdernesse spoke.

'This is Lois Barclay, Master Ralph Hickson's niece.'

'I know nothing of her,' said the mistress of the house, in a deep

voice, almost as masculine as her son's.

'Master Hickson received his sister's letter, did he not? I sent it off

myself by a lad named Elias Wellcome, who left Boston for this place

yester morning.'

'Ralph Hickson has received no such letter. He lies bedridden in the

chamber beyond. Any letters for him must come through my hands;

wherefore I can affirm with certainty that no such letter has been

delivered here. His sister Barclay, she that was Henrietta Hickson, and

whose husband took the oaths to Charles Stuart, and stuck by his living

when all godly men left theirs----'

Lois, who had thought her heart was dead and cold a minute before at

the ungracious reception she had met with, felt words come up into her

mouth at the implied insult to her father, and spoke out, to her own

and the captain's astonishment:

'They might be godly men who left their churches on that day of which

you speak, madam; but they alone were not the godly men, and no one has

a right to limit true godliness for mere opinion's sake.'

'Well said, lass,' spoke out the captain, looking round upon her with a

kind of admiring wonder, and patting her on the back.

Lois and her aunt gazed into each other's eyes unflinchingly, for a

minute or two of silence; but the girl felt her colour coming and

going, while the elder woman's never varied; and the eyes of the young

maiden were filling fast with tears, while those of Grate Hickson kept

on their stare, dry and unwavering.

'Mother!' said the young man, rising up with a quicker motion than any

one had yet used in this house, 'it is ill speaking of such matters

when my cousin comes first among us. The Lord may give her grace

hereafter, but she has travelled from Boston city to-day, and she and

this seafaring man must need rest and food.'

He did not attend to see the effect of his words, but sat down again,

and seemed to be absorbed in his book in an instant. Perhaps he knew

that his word was law with his grim mother, for he had hardly ceased

speaking before she had pointed to a wooden settle; and smoothing the

lines on her countenance, she said, 'What Manasseh says is true. Sit

down here, while I bid Faith and Nattee get food ready; and meanwhile I

will go tell my husband, that one who calls herself his sister's child

is come over to pay him a visit.'

She went to the door leading into the kitchen, and gave some directions

to the elder girl, whom Lois now knew to be the daughter of the house.

Faith stood impassive, while her mother spoke, scarcely caring to look

at the newly-arrived strangers. She was like her brother Manasseh in

complexion, but had handsomer features, and large, mysterious-looking

eyes, as Lois saw, when once she lifted them up, and took in, as it

were, the aspect of the sea-captain and her cousin with one swift

searching look. About the stiff, tall, angular mother, and the scarce

less pliant figure of the daughter, a girl of twelve years old, or

thereabouts, played all manner of impish antics, unheeded by them, as

if it were her accustomed habit to peep about, now under their arms,

now at this side, now at that, making grimaces all the while at Lois

and Captain Holdernesse, who sat facing the door, weary, and somewhat

disheartened by their reception. The captain pulled out tobacco, and

began to chew it by way of consolation; but in a moment or two, his

usual elasticity of spirit came to his rescue, and he said in a low

voice to Lois:

'That scoundrel Elias, I will give it him! If the letter had but been

delivered, thou wouldst have had a different kind of welcome; but as

soon as I have had some victuals, I will go out and find the lad, and

bring back the letter, and that will make all right, my wench. Nay,

don't be downhearted, for I cannot stand women's tears. Thou'rt just

worn out with the shaking and the want of food.'

Lois brushed away her tears, and looking round to try and divert her

thoughts by fixing them on present object, she caught her cousin

Manasseh's deep-set eyes furtively watching her. It was with no

unfriendly gaze, yet it made Lois uncomfortable, particularly as he did

not withdraw his looks after he must have seen that she observed him.

She was glad when her aunt called her into an inner room to see her

uncle, and she escaped from the steady observance of her gloomy, silent

cousin.

Ralph Hickson was much older than his wife, and his illness made him

look older still. He had never had the force of character that Grace,

his spouse, possessed, and age and sickness had now rendered him almost

childish at times. But his nature was affectionate, and stretching out

his trembling arms from where he lay bedridden, he gave Lois an

unhesitating welcome, never waiting for the confirmation of the missing

letter before he acknowledged her to be his niece.

'Oh! 'tis kind in thee to come all across the sea to make acquaintance

with thine uncle; kind in Sister Barclay to spare thee!'

Lois had to tell him that there was no one living to miss her at home

in England; that in fact she had no home in England, no father nor

mother left upon earth; and that she had been bidden by her mother's

last words to seek him out, and ask him for a home. Her words came up,

half choked from a heavy heart, and his dulled wits could not take

their meaning in without several repetitions; and then he cried like a

child, rather at his own loss of a sister, whom he had not seen for

more than twenty years, than at that of the orphan's standing before

him, trying hard not to cry, but to start bravely in this new strange

home. What most of all helped Lois in her self-restraint was her aunt's

unsympathetic look. Born and bred in New England, Grace Hickson had a

kind of jealous dislike to her husband's English relations, which had

increased since of late years his weakened mind yearned after them, and

he forgot the good reason he had had for his self-exile, and moaned

over the decision which had led to it as the great mistake of his life.

'Come,' said she, 'it strikes me that, in all this sorrow for the loss

of one who died full of years, ye are forgetting in Whose hands life

and death are!'

True words, but ill-spoken at that time. Lois looked up at her with a

scarcely disguised indignation; which increased as she heard the

contemptuous tone in which her aunt went on talking to Ralph Hickson,

even while she was arranging his bed with a regard to his greater

comfort.

'One would think thou wert a godless man, by the moan thou art always

making over spilt milk; and truth is, thou art but childish in thine

old age. When we were wed, thou left all things to the Lord; I would

never have married thee else. Nay, lass,' said she, catching the

expression on Lois's face, 'thou art never going to browbeat me with

thine angry looks. I do my duty as I read it, and there is never a man

in Salem that dare speak a word to Grace Hickson about either her works

or her faith. Godly Mr. Cotton Mather hath said, that even he might

learn of me; and I would advise thee rather to humble thyself, and see

if the Lord may not convert thee from thy ways, since he has sent thee

to dwell, as it were, in Zion, where the precious dew falls daily on

Aaron's beard.'

Lois felt ashamed and sorry to find that her aunt had so truly

interpreted the momentary expression of her features; she blamed

herself a little for the feeling that had caused that expression,

trying to think how much her aunt might have been troubled with

something before the unexpected irruption of the strangers, and again

hoping that the remembrance of this little misunderstanding would soon

pass away. So she endeavoured to reassure herself, and not to give way

to her uncle's tender trembling pressure of her hand, as, at her aunt's

bidding, she wished him good night, and returned into the outer, or

'keeping'-room, where all the family were now assembled, ready for the

meal of flour cakes and venison-steaks which Nattee, the Indian

servant, was bringing in from the kitchen. No one seemed to have been

speaking to Captain Holdernesse while Lois had been away. Manasseh sat

quiet and silent where he did, with the book open upon his knee, his

eyes thoughtfully fixed on vacancy, as if he saw a vision, or dreamed

dreams. Faith stood by the table, lazily directing Nattee in her

preparations; and Prudence lolled against the door-frame, between

kitchen and keeping-room, playing tricks on the old Indian woman as she

passed backwards and forwards, till Nattee appeared to be in a strong

state of expressed irritation, which he tried in vain to repress, as

whenever she showed any sign of it, Prudence only seemed excited to

greater mischief. When all was ready, Manasseh lifted his right hand,

and 'asked a blessing,' as it was termed; but the grace became a long

prayer for abstract spiritual blessings, for strength to combat Satan,

and to quench his fiery darts, and at length assumed, so Lois thought,

a purely personal character, as if the young man had forgotten the

occasion, and even the people present, but was searching into the

nature of the diseases that beset his own sick soul, and spreading them

out before the Lord. He was brought back by a pluck at the coat from

Prudence; he opened his shut eyes, cast an angry glance at the child,

who made a face at him for sole reply, and then he sat down, and they

all fell to. Grace Hickson would have thought her hospitality sadly at

fault, if she had allowed Captain Holdernesse to go out in search of a

bed. Skins were spread for him on the floor of the keeping-room; a

Bible, and a square bottle of spirits were placed on the table, to

supply his wants during the night; and in spite of all the cares and

troubles, temptations, or sins of the members of that household, they

were all asleep before the town clock struck ten.

In the morning, the captain's first care was to go out in search of the

boy Elias, and the missing letter. He met him bringing it with an easy

conscience, for, thought Elias, a few hours sooner or later will make

no difference; to-night or the morrow morning will be all the same. But

he was startled into a sense of wrong-doing by a sound box on the ear,

from the very man who had charged him to deliver it speedily, and whom

he believed to be at that very moment in Boston city.

The letter delivered, all possible proof being given that Lois had a

right to claim a home from her nearest relations, Captain Holdernesse

thought it best to take leave.

'Thou'lt take to them, lass, maybe, when there is no one here to make

thee think on the old country. Nay, nay! parting is hard work at all

times, and best get hard work done out of hand. Keep up thine heart, my

wench, and I'll come back and see thee next spring, if we are all

spared till then; and who knows what fine young miller mayn't come with

me? Don't go and get wed to a praying Puritan, meanwhile. There,

there--I'm off! God bless thee!'

And Lois was left alone in New England.

Chapter 2

It was hard up-hill work for Lois to win herself a place in this

family. Her aunt was a woman of narrow, strong affections. Her love for

her husband, if ever she had any, was burnt out and dead long ago. What

she did for him she did from duty; but duty was not strong enough to

restrain that little member the tongue; and Lois's heart often bled at

the continual flow of contemptuous reproof which Grace constantly

addressed to her husband, even while she was sparing no pains or

trouble to minister to his bodily ease and comfort. It was more as a

relief to herself that she spoke in this way, than with any desire that

her speeches should affect him; and he was too deadened by illness to

feel hurt by them; or, it may be, the constant repetition of her

sarcasms had made him indifferent; at any rate, so that he had his food

and his state of bodily warmth attended to, he very seldom seemed to

care much for anything else. Even his first flow of affection towards

Lois was soon exhausted; he cared for her because she arranged his

pillows well and skilfully, and because she could prepare new and

dainty kinds of food for his sick appetite, but no longer for her as

his dead sister's child. Still he did care for her, and Lois was too

glad of this little hoard of affection to examine how or why it was

given. To him she could give pleasure, but apparently to no one else in

that household. Her aunt looked askance at her for many reasons: the

first coming of Lois to Salem was inopportune, the expression of

disapprobation on her face on that evening still lingered and rankled

in Grace's memory, early prejudices, and feelings, and prepossessions

of the English girl were all on the side of what would now be called

Church and State, what was then esteemed in that country a

superstitious observance of the directions of a Popish rubric, and a

servile regard for the family of an oppressing and irreligious king.

Nor is it to be supposed that Lois did not feel, and feel acutely, the

want of sympathy that all those with whom she was now living manifested

towards the old hereditary loyalty (religious as well as political

loyalty) in which she had been brought up. With her aunt and Manasseh

it was more than want of sympathy; it was positive, active antipathy to

all the ideas Lois held most dear. The very allusion, however

incidentally made, to the little old grey church at Barford, where her

father had preached so long,--the occasional reference to the troubles

in which her own country had been distracted when she left,--and the

adherence, in which she had been brought up, to the notion that the

king could do no wrong, seemed to irritate Manasseh past endurance. He

would get up from his reading, his constant employment when at home,

and walk angrily about the room after Lois had said anything of this

kind, muttering to himself; and once he had even stopped before her,

and in a passionate tone bade her not talk so like a fool. Now this was

very different to his mother's sarcastic, contemptuous way of treating

all poor Lois's little loyal speeches. Grace would lead her on--at

least she did at first, till experience made Lois wiser--to express her

thoughts on such subjects, till, just when the girl's heart was

opening, her aunt would turn round upon her with some bitter sneer that

roused all the evil feelings in Lois's disposition by its sting. Now

Manasseh seemed, through all his anger, to be so really grieved by what

he considered her error, that he went much nearer to convincing her

that there might be two sides to a question. Only this was a view, that

it appeared like treachery to her dead father's memory to entertain.

Somehow, Lois felt instinctively that Manasseh was really friendly

towards her. He was little in the house; there was farming, and some

kind of mercantile business to be transacted by him, as real head of

the house; and as the season drew on, he went shooting and hunting in

the surrounding forests, with a daring which caused his mother to warn

and reprove him in private, although to the neighbours she boasted

largely of her son's courage and disregard of danger. Lois did not

often walk out for the mere sake of walking, there was generally some

household errand to be transacted when any of the women of the family

went abroad; but once or twice she had caught glimpses of the dreary,

dark wood, hemming in the cleared land on all sides,--the great wood

with its perpetual movement of branch and bough, and its solemn wail,

that came into the very streets of Salem when certain winds blew,

bearing the sound of the pine-trees clear upon the ears that had

leisure to listen. And from all accounts, this old forest, girdling

round the settlement, was full of dreaded and mysterious beasts, and

still more to be dreaded Indians, stealing in and out among the

shadows, intent on bloody schemes against the Christian people;

panther-streaked, shaven Indians, in league by their own confession, as

well as by the popular belief, with evil powers.

Nattee, the old Indian servant, would occasionally make Lois's blood

run cold as she and Faith and Prudence listened to the wild stories she

told them of the wizards of her race. It was often in the kitchen, in

the darkening evening, while some cooking process was going on, that

the old Indian crone, sitting on her haunches by the bright red wood

embers which sent up no flame, but a lurid light reversing the shadows

of all the faces around, told her weird stories while they were

awaiting the rising of the dough, perchance, out of which the household

bread had to be made. There ran through these stories always a ghastly,

unexpressed suggestion of some human sacrifice being needed to complete

the success of any incantation to the Evil One; and the poor old

creature, herself believing and shuddering as she narrated her tale in

broken English, took a strange, unconscious pleasure in her power over

her hearers--young girls of the oppressing race, which had brought her

down into a state little differing from slavery, and reduced her people

to outcasts on the hunting-grounds which had belonged to her fathers.

After such tales, it required no small effort on Lois's part to go out,

at her aunt's command, into the common pasture round the town, and

bring the cattle home at night. Who knew but what the double-headed

snake might start up from each blackberry-bush--that wicked, cunning,

accursed creature in the service of the Indian wizards, that had such

power over all those white maidens who met the eyes placed at either

end of his long, sinuous, creeping body, so that loathe him, loathe the

Indian race as they would, off they must go into the forest to seek but

some Indian man, and must beg to be taken into his wigwam, abjuring

faith and race for ever? Or there were spells--so Nattee said--hidden

about the ground by the wizards, which changed that person's nature who

found them; so that, gentle and loving as they might have been before,

thereafter they took no pleasure but in the cruel torments of others,

and had a strange power given to them of causing such torments at their

will. Once Nattee, speaking low to Lois, who was alone with her in the

kitchen, whispered out her terrified belief that such a spell had

Prudence found; and when the Indian showed her arms to Lois, all

pinched and black and blue by the impish child, the English girl began

to be afraid of her cousin as of one possessed. But it was not Nattee

alone, nor young imaginative girls alone, that believed in these

stories. We can afford to smile at them now; but our English ancestors

entertained superstitions of much the same character at the same

period, and with less excuse, as the circumstances surrounding them

were better known, and consequently more explicable by common sense

than the real mysteries of the deep, untrodden forests of New England.

The gravest divines not only believed stories similar to that of the

double-headed serpent, and other tales of witchcraft, but they made

such narrations the subjects of preaching and prayer; and as cowardice

makes us all cruel, men who were blameless in many of the relations of

life, and even praiseworthy in some, became, from superstition, cruel

persecutors about this time, showing no mercy towards any one whom they

believed to be in league with the Evil One.

Faith was the person with whom the English girl was the most intimately

associated in her uncle's house. The two were about the same age, and

certain household employments were shared between them. They took it in

turns to call in the cows, to make up the butter which had been churned

by Hosea, a stiff old out-door servant, in whom Grace Hickson placed

great confidence; and each lassie had her great spinning-wheel for

wool, and her lesser for flax, before a month had elapsed after Lois's

coming. Faith was a grave, silent person, never merry, sometimes very

sad, though Lois was a long time in even guessing why. She would try in

her sweet, simple fashion to cheer her cousin up, when the latter was

depressed, by telling her old stories of English ways and life.

Occasionally, Faith seemed to care to listen, occasionally she did not

heed one word, but dreamed on. Whether of the past or of the future,

who could tell?

Stern old ministers came in to pay their pastoral visits. On such

occasions, Grace Hickson would put on clean apron and clean cap, and

make them more welcome than she was ever seen to do no one else,

bringing out the best provisions of her store, and setting of all

before them. Also, the great Bible was brought forth, and Hosea and

Nattee summoned from their work to listen while the minister read a

chapter, and, as he read, expounded it at considerable length. After

this all knelt, while he, standing, lifted up his right hand, and

prayed for all possible combinations of Christian men, for all possible

cases of spiritual need; and lastly, taking the individuals before him,

he would put up a very personal supplication for each, according to his

notion of their wants. At first Lois wondered at the aptitude of one or

two prayers of this description to the outward circumstances of each

case; but when she perceived that her aunt had usually a pretty long

confidential conversation with the minister in the early part of his

visit, she became aware that he received both his impressions and his

knowledge through the medium of 'that godly woman, Grace Hickson;' and

I am afraid she paid less regard to the prayer 'for the maiden from

another land, who hath brought the errors of that land as a seed with

her, even across the great ocean, and who is letting even now the

little seeds shoot up into an evil tree, in which all unclean creatures

may find shelter.'

'I like the prayers of our Church better,' said Lois, one day to Faith.

'No clergyman in England can pray his own words, and therefore it is

that he cannot judge of others so as to fit his prayers to what he

esteems to be their case, as Mr. Tappau did this morning.'

'I hate Mr. Tappau!' said Faith, shortly, a passionate flash of light

coming out of her dark, heavy eyes.

'Why so cousin? It seems to me as if he were a good man, although I

like not his prayers.'

Faith only repeated her words, 'I hate him.'

Lois was sorry for this strong bad feeling; instinctively sorry, for

she was loving herself, delighted in being loved, and felt a jar run

through her at every sign of want of love in others. But she did not

know what to say, and was silent at the time. Faith, too, went on

turning her wheel with vehemence, but spoke never a word until her

thread snapped, and then she pushed the wheel away hastily and left the

room.

Then Prudence crept softly up to Lois's side. This strange child seemed

to be tossed about by varying moods: to-day she was caressing and

communicative, to-morrow she might be deceitful, mocking, and so

indifferent to the pain or sorrows of others that you could call her

almost inhuman.

'So thou dost not like Pastor Tappau's prayers?' she whispered.

Lois was sorry to have been overheard, but she neither would nor could

take back her words.

'I like them not so well as the prayers I used to hear at home.'

'Mother says thy home was with the ungodly. Nay, don't look at me

so--it was not I that said it. I'm none so fond of praying myself, nor

of Pastor Tappau for that matter. But Faith cannot abide him, and I

know why. Shall I tell thee, cousin Lois?'

'No! Faith did not tell me, and she was the right person to give her

own reasons.'

'Ask her where young Mr. Nolan is gone to, and thou wilt hear. I have

seen Faith cry by the hour together about Mr. Nolan.'

'Hush, child, hush!' said Lois, for she heard Faith's approaching step,

and feared lest she should overhear what they were saying.

The truth was that, a year or two before, there had been a great

struggle in Salem village, a great division in the religious body, and

Pastor Tappau had been the leader of the more violent, and, ultimately,

the successful party. In consequence of this, the less popular

minister, Mr. Nolan, had had to leave the place. And him Faith Hickson

loved with all the strength of her passionate heart, although he never

was aware of the attachment he had excited, and her own family were too

regardless of manifestations of mere feeling to ever observe the signs

of any emotion on her part. But the old Indian servant Nattee saw and

observed them all. She knew, as well as if she had been told the

reason, why Faith had lost all care about father or mother, brother and

sister, about household work and daily occupation, nay, about the

observances of religion as well. Nattee read the meaning of the deep

smouldering of Faith's dislike to Pastor Tappau aright; the Indian

woman understood why the girl (whom alone of all the white people she

loved) avoided the old minister,--would hide in the wood-stack sooner

than be called in to listen to his exhortations and prayers. With

savage, untutored people, it is not 'Love me, love my dog,' they are

often jealous of the creature beloved; but it is, 'Whom thou hatest I

will hate;' and Nattee's feeling towards Pastor Tappau was even an

exaggeration of the mute unspoken hatred of Faith.

For a long time, the cause of her cousin's dislike and avoidance of the

minister was a mystery to Lois; but the name of Nolan remained in her

memory whether she would or no, and it was more from girlish interest

in a suspected love affair, than from any indifferent and heartless

curiosity, that she could not help piecing together little speeches and

actions, with Faith's interest in the absent banished minister, for an

explanatory clue, till not a doubt remained in her mind. And this

without any further communication with Prudence, for Lois declined

hearing any more on the subject from her, and so gave deep offence.

Faith grew sadder and duller as the autumn drew on. She lost her

appetite, her brown complexion became sallow and colourless, her dark

eyes looked hollow and wild. The first of November was near at hand.

Lois, in her instinctive, well-intentioned efforts to bring some life

and cheerfulness into the monotonous household, had been telling Faith

of many English customs, silly enough, no doubt, and which scarcely

lighted up a flicker of interest in the American girl's mind. The

cousins were lying awake in their bed in the great unplastered room,

which was in part store-room, in part bedroom. Lois was full of

sympathy for Faith that night. For long she had listened to her

cousin's heavy, irrepressible sighs, in silence. Faith sighed because

her grief was of too old a date for violent emotion or crying. Lois

listened without speaking in the dark, quiet night hours, for a long,

long time. She kept quite still, because she thought such vent for

sorrow might relieve her cousin's weary heart. But when at length,

instead of lying motionless, Faith seemed to be growing restless even

to convulsive motions of her limbs, Lois began to speak, to talk about

England, and the dear old ways at home, without exciting much attention

on Faith's part, until at length she fell upon the subject of

Hallow-e'en, and told about customs then and long afterwards practised

in England, and that have scarcely yet died out in Scotland. As she

told of tricks she had often played, of the apple eaten facing a

mirror, of the dripping sheet, of the basins of water, of the nuts

burning side by side, and many other such innocent ways of divination,

by which laughing, trembling English maidens sought to see the form of

their future husbands, if husbands they were to have, then Faith

listened breathlessly, asking short, eager questions, as if some ray of

hope had entered into her gloomy heart. Lois went on speaking, telling

her of all the stories that would confirm the truth of the second sight

vouchsafed to all seekers in the accustomed methods, half believing,

half incredulous herself, but desiring, above all things, to cheer up

poor Faith.

Suddenly, Prudence rose up from her truckle-bed in the dim corner of

the room. They had not thought that she was awake, but she had been

listening long.

'Cousin Lois may go out and meet Satan by the brook-side if she will,

but if thou goest, Faith, I will tell mother--ay, and I will tell

Pastor Tappau, too. Hold thy stories, Cousin Lois, I am afeard of my

very life. I would rather never be wed at all, than feel the touch of

the creature that would take the apple out of my hand, as I held it

over my left shoulder.' The excited girl gave a loud scream of terror

at the image her fancy had conjured up. Faith and Lois sprang out

towards her, flying across the moonlit room in their white nightgowns.

At the same instant, summoned by the same cry, Grace Hickson came to

her child.

'Hush! hush!' said Faith, authoritatively.

'What is it, my wench?' asked Grace. While Lois, feeling as if she had

done all the mischief, kept silence.

'Take her away, take her away!' screamed Prudence. 'Look over her

shoulder--her left shoulder--the Evil One is there now, I see him

stretching over for the half-bitten apple.'

'What is this she says?' said Grace, austerely.

'She is dreaming,' said Faith; 'Prudence, hold thy tongue.' And she

pinched the child severely, while Lois more tenderly tried to soothe

the alarms she felt that she had conjured up.

'Be quiet, Prudence,' said she, 'and go to sleep. I will stay by thee

till thou hast gone off into slumber.'

'No, go! go away,' sobbed Prudence, who was really terrified at first,

but was now assuming more alarm: than she felt, if from the pleasure

she received at perceiving herself the centre of attention. 'Faith

shall stay by me, not you, wicked English witch!'

So Faith sat by her sister; and Grace, displeased and perplexed,

withdrew to her own bed, purposing to inquire more into the matter in

the morning. Lois only hoped it might all be forgotten by that time,

and resolved never to talk again of such things. But an event happened

in the remaining hours of the night to change the current of affairs.

While Grace had been absent from her room, her husband had had another

paralytic stroke: whether he, too, had been alarmed by that eldritch

scream no one could ever know. By the faint light of the rush candle

burning at the bedside, his wife perceived that a great change had

taken place in his aspect on her return: the irregular breathing came

almost like snorts--the end was drawing near. The family were roused,

and all help given that either the doctor or experience could suggest.

But before the late November morning light, all was ended for Ralph

Hickson.

The whole of the ensuing day, they sat or moved in darkened rooms, and

spoke few words, and those below their breath. Manasseh kept at home,

regretting his father, no doubt, but showing little emotion. Faith was

the child that bewailed her loss most grievously; she had a warm heart,

hidden away somewhere under her moody exterior, and her father had

shown her far more passive kindness than ever her mother had done, for

Grace made distinct favourites of Manasseh, her only son, and Prudence,

her youngest child. Lois was about as unhappy as any of them, for she

had felt strongly drawn towards her uncle as her kindest friend, and

the sense of his loss renewed the old sorrow she had experienced at her

own parents' death. But she had no time and no place to cry in. On her

devolved many of the cares, which it would have seemed indecorous in

the nearer relatives to interest themselves in enough to take an active

part: the change required in their dress, the household preparations

for the sad feast of the funeral--Lois had to arrange all under her

aunt's stern direction.

But a day or two afterwards--the last day before the funeral--she went

into the yard to fetch in some fagots for the oven; it was a solemn,

beautiful, starlit evening, and some sudden sense of desolation in the

midst of the vast universe thus revealed touched Lois's heart, and she

sat down behind the woodstack, and cried very plentiful tears.

She was startled by Manasseh, who suddenly turned the corner of the

stack, and stood before her.

'Lois crying!'

'Only a little,' she said, rising up, and gathering her bundle of

fagots, for she dreaded being questioned by her grim, impassive cousin.

To her surprise, he laid his hand on her arm, and said:

'Stop one minute. Why art thou crying, cousin?'

'I don't know,' she said, just like a child questioned in like manner;

and she was again on the point of weeping.

'My father was very kind to thee, Lois; I do not wonder that thou

grievest after him. But the Lord who taketh away can restore tenfold. I

will be as kind as my father--yea, kinder. This is not a time to talk

of marriage and giving in marriage. But after we have buried our dead,

I wish to speak to thee.'

Lois did not cry now, but she shrank with affright. What did her cousin

mean? She would far rather that he had been angry with her for

unreasonable grieving, for folly.