| PAGE | |
| LITTLE WHITE SOULS—Continued, | [1] |
| STILL WATERS, | [21] |
| CHIT-CHAT FROM ANDALUSIA, | [59] |
| THE SECRET OF ECONOMY, | [75] |
| ‘MOTHER,’ | [93] |
| IN THE HEART OF THE ARDENNES, | [133] |
| A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHTMARE, | [165] |
| THE GHOST OF CHARLOTTE CRAY, | [203] |
LITTLE WHITE SOULS
(Continued).
Ethel calls the woman some opprobrious epithet, but walks away nevertheless, and lets her do as she will; only the next day she writes a full account to Charlie of what she has gone through, and tells him she thinks all the servants are going mad. In which opinion he entirely agrees with her.
‘For “mad” read “bad,”’ he writes back again, ‘and I’m with you. There is no doubt upon the matter, my dear girl. The brutes don’t like the cold, and are playing tricks upon you to try and force you to return to the plains. It is a common thing in this country. Don’t give way to them, but tell them I’ll stop their pay all round if anything unpleasant happens again. I think now you must confess it would have been better to take my advice and try a trip home instead. However, as you are at Mandalinati, don’t come back until your object in going there is accomplished. I wish I could join you, but it is impossible just yet. Jack Lawless is obliged to go north on business, and I have promised to accompany him. Keep up a good heart, dearest, and don’t let those brutes think they have any power to annoy or frighten you.’
‘Going north on business!’ exclaims Ethel bitterly; ‘and she is going too, I suppose; and Charlie can find time to go with them, though he cannot come to me. Oh, it is too hard! It is more than any woman can be expected to bear! I’m sure I wish I had gone to England instead. Then I should at least have had my dear sister to tell my troubles to, and he—he would have been free to flirt with that wretched woman as much as ever he chose.’
And the poor wife lies in her bed that night too unhappy to sleep, while she pictures her husband doing all sorts of dishonourable things, instead of snoring, as he really is, in his own deserted couch. Her room adjoins that in which the Dye is sleeping with her little girl, and the door between them stands wide open. From where she lies, Ethel can see part of the floor of Katie’s bedroom, from which the moonlight is excluded in consequence of the great black shawl which the nurse continues to pin nightly across the window-pane. Suddenly, as she watches the shaded floor without thinking of it, a streak of moonshine darts right athwart it, as if a corner of the curtain had been raised. Always full of fears for her child, Ethel slips off her own bed, and with noiseless, unslippered feet runs into the next room, only in time to see part of a white dress upon the terrace as some unseen hand hastily drops the shawl again. She crosses the floor, and opening the window, looks out. Nobody is in sight. From end to end of the broad terraces the moonlight lies undisturbed by any shadow, though she fancies her ear can discern the rustling of a garment sweeping the stone foundation. As she turns to the darkened chamber again, she finds the Dye is sitting up, awake and trembling.