"I think every one is to be pitied; and Jack more than most,—after dear Nicholas," she says, gently, with such a kindly glance at Violet as goes straight to that young woman's heart, and grows and blossoms there forever after.
CHAPTER XXV.
HOW DISCUSSION WAXES RIFE—AND HOW NICHOLAS, HAVING MADE A SUGGESTION THAT IS BITTER TO THE EARS OF HIS AUDIENCE, YET CARRIES HIS POINT AGAINST ALL OPPOSITION.
"The day is done, and the darkness falls from the wings of night." The dusk is slowly creeping up over all the land, the twilight is coming on apace. As the day was, so is the gathering eve, sad and mournful, with sounds of rain and sobbings of swift winds as they rush through the barren beeches in the grove. The harbor bar is moaning many miles away, yet its voice is borne by rude Boreas up from the bay to the walls of the stately Towers, that neither rock nor shiver before the charges of this violent son of "imperial Æolus."
There is a ghostly tapping (as of some departed spirit who would fain enter once again into the old halls so long forgotten) against the window pane. Doubtless it is some waving branch flung hither and thither by the cruel tempest that rages without. Shadows come and go; and eerie thoughts oppress the breast:—
"Whilst the scritch-owl, scritching loud,
Puts the wretch that lies in woe
In remembrance of a shroud."
"What a wretched evening!" says Violet, with a little shiver. "Geoffrey, draw the curtains closer."
"A fit ending to a miserable day," says Lady Rodney, gloomily.
"Night has always the effect of making bad look worse," says Doatie with a sad attempt at cheerfulness. "Never mind; morning will soon be here again."