"'Twas a poor lover to sleep at such a time. I'd none of him were I as fair as you," said Nicholas, with the same air of mock-courtesy.
"And the rain came down—red, like the daisies—and spread and spread over the stone—and dripped and dripped on to Wayne's cold forehead as he lay below——"
"They've not buried him yet, Mistress," laughed one of the youngsters.
"Oh, but they have, sir!" she answered, turning her great blue eyes on him. "They put him on to one of those little shelves that Sexton Witherlee showed me once—and then they covered him with a flat stone, with rings on it, because they knew that was the only way to hold him back from haunting me. But he doesn't heed the stone, and I want Dick—I want my lover, who is so big and strong, to wake and stand between Wayne's ghost and me."
Nicholas Ratcliffe watched every pitiful turn of speech and gesture, and laughed to himself as he drew her on. "So your lover sleeps, Mistress?" he said, softly.
"Yes, amongst the red daisies. And I could not wake him, though I tried my hardest. And, oh, sir, will you tell him that we shall never be in time, never be in time, unless he does not soon bestir himself?"
"I'll tell him, never fear. Robert, what dost make of it? Is't not as I told thee, a night's wandering among the bogs has turned her wits?"
"There's more in it; what is this tale of blood?" muttered Robert. "God, yes, and her bosom is stained with something of a deeper dye than rain."
"The wind moaned so in the heather, all the long night," wailed the woman, "and I was cold, and hungry, and sadly frightened. Why will he not wake? Two little corpse-candles are fluttering over the marsh—how they shine, like the dead man's eyes! There was Wayne lying there at Marsh, and they said they had closed his eyes—but I knew, I knew! His eyes burned—and wherever I moved they followed me—sir, will you not bid my lover wake?"
She turned from the old man suddenly, her wandering fancy caught by the beat of horse-hoofs up the road. "That is the post-chaise, come to carry us to Saxilton," she said.