She had gone to sleep one windy night, listening to the heavy shutters rattling and to the threshing of the branches in the great trees outside, and had dreamed, as she always did in a storm, of high roaring waves and a good ship pounding upon cruel rocks. She awoke suddenly with the thunder of it still in her ears. But no, that noise was real, it was some one beating upon the great front door, striking frantic blows on the knocker in an effort to rouse the house.
Hastily slipping on some clothes and lighting a candle which guttered and flickered as she passed down the stairs, she hurried to the door, unbarred it, and flung it open. A gust of wind and rain rushed in, extinguished the candle and fairly blew a wild dishevelled figure into her arms. By the light from the dying coals that still glowed in the big hall fireplace, Clotilde was able to recognise her visitor.
“Why, Agnes, Agnes Twitchell,” she cried, “what brings you here?”
Agnes Twitchell it was, clad only in her nightgown with a shawl wrapped about her, with her hair flying and her teeth chattering.
“I—I came to tell you,” she began, and then broke all into wild and joyful weeping. “God forgive me for all the wrong I have done you, Mistress Radpath,” she cried, “there—there is a ship coming in!”
If she had more words to say, she could not speak them, for at that she broke down utterly and clung to Clotilde, trembling and sobbing aloud. Clotilde half carried her to the settle, blew up the fire and brought a warm cloak to wrap about her. A startled servant came down the stairs and was sent for hot water and restoratives. Whenever Clotilde even so much as looked toward the door, Agnes screamed and wept afresh.
“Do not leave me,” she begged. “It might not be true! I might have dreamed it.”
Clotilde felt that it would indeed be cruel to leave the girl in the midst of such hysterical terror. Only once, when she ran upstairs for more warm blankets, did she dare to stop for a moment at the small round window and look out. There through the dark, she saw the ship speeding up the harbour like a half-seen phantom, its close-reefed sails showing like pale ghosts against the headland. It might indeed have been a vision or a dream.
It seemed a long, long time before Agnes was quieted. At last, however, her tense fingers relaxed, her tears ceased flowing and she leaned back in the great chair.
“Yes,” she said, reading the longing in Clotilde’s eyes, “go you and see if it is really so, Mistress Radpath. I could never bear to ask the truth myself.”