"Why, ain't ye heard?" he cried. "Yer house was burnt down to the groun' las' night. Thought ye was in it, the doctor did. That's how he so nigh got killed."
XXI
There are some hours of human experience so intense with suffering that they return, again and again, living themselves over in the memory, arising in the small hours of the night—haunting specters of pain, meeting us unexpectedly in an unguarded moment of solitude to open and reopen the wounds they have left, following us on through the years with a recurring vindictiveness of pain almost as keen as when it was first inflicted. Joy, happiness, exaltation of spirit, return only in new guises; they, too, make their impression upon the memory, but otherwise. The shock of loss, the agony of parting, the fear and dread of the suffering of loved ones, the bitterness of self-reproach, the message of loss—these are the things that return and return again; and of such as these were the hours of that afternoon to Rosamund. Not only on that first night, once more in the small upper room at Mother Cary's, but often and often during her after life did the shock and agony of those hours return to her.
Past the form of the station master, gloating in his satisfaction at being the first to tell her the evil news, she had seen Father Cary's familiar form descending from his wagon. She scarcely remarked his surprise at her being there, his disappointment that Doctor Blake and the nurse had not come on that train, his helping her into the wagon, and his description of the events of the night before. The drive past the dull little houses and the store, the closed cottages, the big hotels with their uncurtained windows staring like eyeless sockets, the woods, the glimpses of the path where she had faced John Ogilvie; the turn at last toward the brown cottage she had come to love so dearly; the blackened, smoking hole that alone remained of it; then the half mile farther to the house where Ogilvie lay—those were the moments of most intense pain, because of their suspense.
The story was simple enough. The little household had gone to bed early, and toward midnight Grace had awakened with a whispering fear of smoke. She roused the others, and Eleanor had bundled sleepy Tim in blankets, thrown other bed covering out of a window, and gone quietly down with Grace. Matt and Sue, wild with fear, rushed out ahead of them, shouting, and their cries aroused the nearest neighbors. Country folk come quickly to a fire, although there is seldom anything to do but watch and surmise; a small crowd gathered in an incredibly short time, and a few things were rescued from the blazing house. In spite of the pleading of the women, Grace stayed to watch the flames, wringing her hands, and calling Rosamund's name. Eleanor was half frantic herself, with the alternate efforts at calming Timmy and beseeching Grace to go away. But Grace, loving and faithful, was crying at the loss of the house and the things in it that had seemed to her so beautiful, and that were so dear because they belonged to Rosamund. She could not be persuaded to leave, but stood wringing her hands and saying, over and over,
"Oh, Miss Rose! Oh, Miss Rose!"
"A small crowd gathered in an incredibly short time."