Chapter Fourteen.
A Great Horror.
Those two hours did soon slip away, and after assuring herself by the clock that the time had really fled, Mrs Morley went and stood in the veranda, gazing out in the full expectation of seeing those for whom she waited coming up from the direction of the river.
The night was glorious. The nearly full moon was silvering the tops of the trees and casting deep, black shadows on the ground. Here and there in the patches of thick shrubbery that had been planted to take off the harsh formality surrounding the parade, there were faint, twinkling sparks that gave a suggestion of how beautiful the river-sides must be where the lights of the curious insects flashed and died out and lit up again in full force; and for some minutes Mrs Morley stood breathing in the sweet, moist perfume of the many night blooms which floated on the air.
“It is very, very beautiful,” she sighed, “but not like home. One tries to get used to it, and does for a time; but there is always that strange feeling of insecurity which will suggest what might happen—we so few, the people here so many, and always looking upon us as infidel intruders who have forced themselves up here to make a home in their very midst. I am too impatient,” she added, with a sigh, as she turned to walk to and fro in the veranda.
“I am too impatient,” she repeated. “On such a beautiful night they would easily be tempted to go a little farther up the river than they intended, and they would tell the men to let the boat float gently back with the stream. They have tired the men, perhaps, and have told them to leave the boat to itself. Yes, a lovely night.”
She went in, with a sigh, to speak to her two native servants and tell them that they need not stay up; but she found her care unnecessary, for they were already asleep. Then, obeying her next impulse, she woke them, telling one to wait and the other to walk with her as far as the river-side.
Here she stood with the woman, watching and trying to pierce the soft, grey mist that hung above the water, before looking round for some one—boatman, or any other native whom she could question. But there was not a soul within sight, and as proof of the lateness of the hour, not a light was to be seen.
“Ah!” she cried, with a start, for the woman behind her had suddenly caught her by the wrist with one hand, while she stood with the other outstretched, pointing up the stream. “What is it?” she said. “Can you see the boat?”
“No. Listen.”