"Go on," cried the Major excitedly; "she must hear it now. Hold up, my
child, only an accident--a slip: trying to make some short cut in the
dark. Now, then," he continued, with military promptitude, "when did
they find him?"
Dinah listened with her head held forward, lips white and trembling, and
her nostrils dilated, hearing her father's words, and all the time
picturing, in imagination, a desperate encounter between two brothers on
the dark hillside. Then the one misjudging, bitter, and mad about her,
struck down, to lie through the night half dead, with upbraidings
against her upon his lips.
It was like a flash: she saw the whole scene while the young clerk went
on in answer to the Major.
"Just off the path, sir."
"And what have you done?"
"Had him carried directly to my rooms at the office, sir."
"Where his brother is seeing to him?"
"No, sir; Mr Jessop Reed has gone off in haste to London on business.
Left a letter for Mr Sturgess. He's ill too, sir. Half delirious with
his bad shoulder, which has broken out again."
"Tut--tut--tut!" ejaculated the Major. "Well? You did something more?"
"Yes, sir, sent off directly to Blinkdale for the doctor, bathed and
bound up Mr Reed's head, and then came on to you."
"Good!" cried the Major sharply, clapping the young man on the shoulder,
and drawing him into the room. "Sit down and swallow a cup of coffee,
my lad. You've had no breakfast. Dinah, my child, be a woman. We'll
go over at once. No. You and Martha make a bed for him in my study.
I'll have him carried here. He cannot stay at that noisy mine."
"Yes--yes," said Dinah, in a whisper, as with trembling hands she
hurriedly placed the coffee before the messenger. "Martha will get that
ready, father. I must come too."
"No, no, my child!--well, yes, you may be of use. Be quick, then. In a
minute we must be off." Then, as Dinah ran up to her room, he went to
the study and returned hastily, placing something in his breast.
"Old soldiers know a little about surgery, Mr Robson," he said. "It
will be a couple of hours before the doctor can get to the mine."
"Three, sir."
"Perhaps, and I may be of use."
"I thought you would come, sir," said Robson, as he hurriedly appeased
his hunger. "There's something wrong, too, at the mine, so one of the
principal men says, but I didn't stop to hear what it was, for I was
coming on here."
"Curse the mine!" roared the Major; "let's think of poor Mr Reed. Ah,
that's right, my dear," he cried sharply, as Dinah came into the room,
looking very white, but firm and determined. "Ready, Mr Robson?"
"Quite, sir," said the messenger, starting up.
"Tell Martha, my dear?"
Dinah nodded. She could not speak, and the next minute they were down
by the river, and then ascended the mountain path, walking quickly along
the narrow shelf, with thrill after thrill passing through the girl, as
she went by the spot where Clive had struck the paper she had offered
him from her hand; and this was supplemented by a suffocating feeling of
despair as they reached the cool, dark, shady cutting, tunnelled out in
the precipitous cliff. Here she glanced wildly at the spot where she
had flown, as she believed, to her lover's arms, and rested in them for
a moment, murmuring her delight that he had come.
There was a heavy dull pulsation in her brain, as she passed on with her
father out into the sunshine once again, deafening her to the words he
spoke from time to time, while the mountain side seemed to swim around
before her and the purple heather to rise and fall in waves till the gap
was reached. That pathway to the mine chasm with all its host of
terrible recollections brought her back to the present with a shock, and
she walked down it clinging to her father's arm.
She shivered and felt cold now as she gazed wildly before her. It was
wonderfully changed, but the salient points were the same, and she
hardly noted the many buildings which had sprung up, but gazed excitedly
round, expecting moment by moment that her eyes would light upon the
fierce mocking face of Sturgess; while by a strange confusion of ideas,
the beating of her heart seemed to form itself into the heavy steps of
the man from whom she fled panting with horror, coming in rapid pursuit.
She started nervously again and again, as the figure of some sturdy
workman passed before them, coming or going from different portions of
the busy hive, where a steam-engine was panting heavily, or a huge pump
toiled on tossing out the water from the depths of the mine to run
gurgling along by the side of the path they followed.
At last the new-looking offices were reached, and a group of workmen
drew away to let them pass, while Dinah gazed round nervously, clinging
more tightly now to her father's arm, feeling sure that in another
moment or two she must face the man she feared.