Once on the stairs she paused to listen, but there was no sound, and she hurried on noiseless as a spirit. One of the shutters was ajar, admitting a few gleams of light, by which she could see to unbolt the door.
She was out in the air at last; the first step was taken in safety—in her turn she flew towards the cypress tree. She was under its shadow, the branches writhed and moaned like living things, the moon shot in and out of the gathering clouds, and cast a flickering, uncertain light about that was more terrible than the deepest gloom.
As she stood in the depth of the shadows, a man came out from the thick darkness that lay under a neighboring clump of white pines, and drew close to her.
"I have been here some time," he whispered. "Everything is ready out yonder—rather rough work for a gentleman, but take it as a proof how ready I am to help you, even after all the money is paid in. But do you know that Mellen has been here?"
"I saw him—I know it; we have no time!"
"Fortunately, he will know why the earth is broken up, having done it with his own hands," said the man, with a suppressed laugh, that made Elizabeth shudder. "Better still, he has left the spade—threw it down in angry disappointment. That is fortunate, for mine was partly disabled out yonder: now show me the exact spot."
She had no need to search, only too well she knew the place. Night and day for weeks the dread spot had been with her, in every dream she had watched men digging, digging—digging with frantic haste; and, as in her dreams, all strength seemed to fail, and some unseen power to hold her back, so now, in that frightful reality, her arms fell half paralyzed, and she could not lift her hand to point out the spot.
To and fro the branches swayed above her head, beating themselves about, moaning like evil voices. The wind swept up chill and warningly.
Such a terrible face it was that confronted the man—such a pale terrified face, lighted up with those agonized eyes, that seemed to grow large and wild in the moonlight.
The man stood before her, leaning on his spade, waiting.