"Come, come, I'll give you my arm and umbrella across, Mistress Rowntree."
"But ye've left t' key in t' door?"
"Oh, I'll be back quick enough; it's only a step."
He gave her his arm, and the pair came out together and went slowly up the village street. In less than five minutes the landlord of the Blue Bell returned, locked all the doors, and went to bed, leaving the inn in total darkness.
A quarter of an hour later this total darkness was interrupted; a pale light glimmered in the window close to the ground to the left of the door. This light burned some ten or twenty minutes. Just before it was put out, the window-sash was moved up slowly. Then, when all was once more in darkness, a figure stepped out upon the sill, leapt lightly to the ground, and cautiously drew down the sash.
XXX
SWEET REVENGE
Whistling over the hilltops and thundering through the valleys, down came the wind upon the little lonely house by the roadside; and with the wind, driving rain; and they beat together upon the walls of that corner room wherein Alice Bristo lay trembling between life and death.
The surgeon from Melmerbridge pronounced it to be brain fever. He had found the patient wildly delirious. The case was grave, very grave. Dangerous? There was always danger with an abnormal temperature and delirium. Dr. Mowbray stayed until evening and ultimately left his patient sleeping quietly. He promised to return in the early morning.