She sat there for nearly two hours, and then she got up, and muttered, “Dead and gone—he is dead and gone!” and wandered on the hill desolate.
Her feet wandered, her brain wandered. She found herself at last in a place she recognized. It was Squire Raby's lawn. The moon had just risen, and shone on the turf, and on the little river that went curling round with here and there a deep pool.
She crept nearer, and saw the great bay-window, and a blaze of light behind it.
There she had sung the great Noel with her father; and now he was dead and gone.
There she had been with Henry Little, and seen him recognize his mother's picture; and now he was dead and gone. She had saved his life in vain; he was dead and gone. Every body was dead and gone.
She looked up at the glowing window. She looked down at the pool, with the moon kissing it.
She flung her arms up with a scream of agony, and sunk into the deep pool, where the moon seemed most to smile on it.
Directly after dinner Dr. Amboyne asked to see the unhappy correspondence of which he was to be the judge.
Raby went for the letters, and laid them before him. He took up the fatal letter. “Why, this is not written by Mrs. Little. I know her neat Italian hand too well. See how the letters slant and straggle.”
“Oh! but you must allow for the writer's agitation.”