The direction given by the finger was, however, perfectly clear, and the Trevors were soon driving along a picturesque lane, where trees, still gay with autumnal tints, overarched the narrow way, and with their brown and golden leaves carpeted the sod beneath them.
“What a pretty rural lane!” exclaimed Emmie, as the chaise first turned off from the high-road; but admiration was soon forgotten in discomfort and fear. The lane was apparently not intended as a thoroughfare for carriages, at least in the season of winter. The ground was miry and boggy, and the pony with difficulty dragged the chaise. There were violent jerks when one side or other dropped into one of the deep ruts left by the wheels of the last cart that had passed that way. Vibert plied the whip more vigorously than before, and silenced his sister’s remonstrances by remarking how darkly the clouds were gathering in the evening sky. Young Trevor was but an inexperienced driver, and ever and anon the chaise was jolted violently over some loose stones, or driven so near to the hedge that Emmie had to bend sideways to avoid being struck by straggling bramble or branch. She mentally resolved never again to trust herself to Vibert’s driving.
“Will this lane never come to an end?” exclaimed Emmie, as the first heavy drop from an overshadowing mass of dark cloud fell on her knee. She was but imperfectly protected from rain; for Vibert, in his haste to dash off from the station before his brother could join him, had never thought of taking with him either umbrella or shawl for his sister.
“Here comes the rain with a vengeance, and this stupid beast flounders in the mud as if it were dragging a cannon instead of a chaise,” cried Vibert. “These country lanes drive one out of all patience! Ha! there’s the rumbling of distant thunder!”
“Oh! I trust that we shall reach home soon,” exclaimed Emmie, who, exposed to the heavy downpour, shivered alike from cold and from fear.
“I suspect that we shall never reach home at all by this lane,” said Vibert. “Take my word for it, that little wretch has directed us wrong; I have a great mind to turn the pony round, and get back to the high-road.”
“You can’t turn, the lane is too narrow; you would land us in the hedge!” exclaimed Emmie, who thought that the attempt would inevitably lead to an upset of the chaise. On struggled the steaming pony, down poured the pattering rain; Vibert, almost blinded by the shower and the gathering darkness, could scarcely see the road before him.
“The longest lane has a turning,—there is an opening before us at last!” exclaimed the young driver, as a turn in the winding road brought a highway to view. “We shall reach Myst Court like two drowned rats. Why on earth did you not bring an umbrella, Emmie? I could not think of everything at once.” Vibert had, indeed, thought but of himself.
The want of an umbrella was to Emmie by no means the worst part of her troubles; she was afraid that her brother had indeed been misdirected, and that they might be lost and benighted in a part of the country where they as yet were strangers, exposed to the perils of a thunderstorm, from which the nervous girl shrank with instinctive terror. Emmie had never hitherto even attempted to overcome her fear; and though her uncle’s words now recurred to her mind, the idea of encountering a thunderstorm after nightfall, without even a roof to protect her, put to flight any good resolutions that those words might have roused in her mind.
“There was a flash!” exclaimed Emmie, starting and putting her hands before her eyes. She pressed closer to her brother as if for protection.