CHAPTER VIII. “Why Do You Believe It?”
Then the round of weary duties, cold and formal, came to
meet her, With the life within departed that had given them
each a soul; And her sick heart even slighted gentle words
that came to greet her, For grief spread its shadowy pinions
like a blight upon the whole. A. A. Proctor
The winter sunshine which glanced in a side-long, half-and-half way into Persecution Alley, and struggled in at the closed blinds of Erica's little attic, streamed unchecked into a far more cheerful room in Guilford Square, and illumined a breakfast table, at which was seated one occupant only, apparently making a late and rather hasty meal. He was a man of about eight-and-twenty, and though he was not absolutely good-looking, his face was one which people turned to look at again, not so much because it was in any way striking as far as features went, but because of an unusual luminousness which pervaded it. The eyes, which were dark gray, were peculiarly expressive, and their softness, which might to some have seemed a trifle unmasculine, was counterbalanced by the straight, dark, noticeable eyebrows, as well as by a thoroughly manly bearing and a general impression of unfailing energy which characterized the whole man. His hair, short beard, and mustache were of a deep nut-brown. He was of medium height and very muscular looking.
On the whole it was as pleasant a face as you would often meet with, and it was not to be wondered at that his old grandmother looked up pretty frequently from her arm chair by the fire, and watched him with that beautiful loving pride which in the aged never seems exaggerated and very rarely misplaced.
“You were out very late, were you not, Brian?” she observed, letting her knitting needles rest for a minute, and scrutinizing the rather weary-looking man.
“Till half-past five this morning,” he replied, in a somewhat preoccupied voice.
There was a sad look in his eyes, too, which his grandmother partly understood. She knitted another round of her sock and then said:
“Have you seen Tom Craigie yet?”
“Yes, last night I came across him,” replied Brian. “He told me she had come home. They traveled by night and got in early yesterday morning.”