"It is just as bad to gallop along a wrong road as to walk along one," replied his young companion with a laugh--"only one goes farther, and faster to the devil."
The Old gentleman laughed heartily. "There is something on there which looks like fellow-humanity," he said: "it may be a stunted tree or a milestone, but we may as well ask it the way;" and putting on his spectacles, he walked forward with his head raised to see the better.
Charles Marston followed; and for a minute or two both were inclined to think the form they saw would turn out a mere stump after all, so motionless did it appear. On a nearer approach, however, a human figure became more distinct. It was that of a woman, old, and evidently very poor, sitting motionless on the top of a little hillock, her hand supporting her chin, and her eyes bent upon the ground. The short-cut grey hair escaped from under the torn cap; the face was broad, especially about the forehead; the eyes were large and black; the skin, naturally brown, was now yellow and wrinkled; and the hand which supported the head, while the other lay languidly on the lap, was covered with a soiled and tattered kid glove. Round her shoulders was an old dirty shawl, mended and patched; and the rest of her garmenture was in as dilapidated a state.
She took not the least notice of the two travellers, though they stood and gazed at her for a full minute ere they spoke. At length Mr. Winkworth raised his voice and asked, "Can you tell us which is the London road, my good woman?"
The poor creature lifted her eyes, and looked at them with a scared, wandering expression. "They shaved his head," she said, in the most melancholy tone in the world, "indeed they did. They thought he was mad; but it was only remorse--remorse. He never held up his head after he was quite sure the poor boy was dead--he whom he had wronged, and blighted, and killed."
She paused and began to weep.
"She's mad, poor thing!" said Mr. Winkworth: "she should not be left on this common alone."
"He saved his own life at the boy's expense," said the woman again; "but what a heart he had ever after! Wine would not quiet it--spirits would not keep it up. But when he found the boy was dead, then was the time of suffering. And they thought he was mad when he raved about it, but remorse will rave as well as madness; and they shaved his head and put a strait waistcoat on him; and one of the keepers knocked him down when he struggled; and he died in the night, you know. It was no fault of mine," she added, looking straight at the old man, as if he had accused her. "I could not leave him in his misery because he was sinful. He was my own brother, you know. No, no; I could not do that."
"Of whom are you speaking, my good woman?" asked the younger gentleman in a commonplace tone. "Why, my brother, to be sure," said the poor woman, looking at him with an expression of bewildered surprise--"whom else should I be talking of?--Ay, ay; he was a rich man once, till he took to gambling."
"Stay! here is some one coming," said the old gentleman; "this is a sad sight, Charles Marston. This poor woman has seen better days. This is a bit of a real cashmere shawl she has over her shoulders; I should know one when I see it, I think. We cannot leave her here alone. We'll ask this boy, who comes trudging along, if he has ever seen her before or knows anything about her."