In the great house of Carne there was a stillness in strange contrast with the roaring of the gale outside. But the stillness was big with life's vitalities--love and hate and fear; and, compared with them, the powers without were nothing more than whistling winds that played with shifting sands, and senseless waves that sported with men's lives.
It was not till the new-comer was lying in her warm bed in the room above the oak parlour, shivering spasmodically at times in spite of blankets and warming-pans and a roaring fire, that she spoke to the old woman who had assisted her in grim silence.
The silence and the grimness had not troubled her. They suited her state of mind and body better than speech would have done. Life had lost its savour for her. Of what might lie beyond she knew little and feared much at times, and at times cared naught, craving only rest from all the ills of life and the poignant pains that racked her.
It was only when Mrs. Lee had carefully straightened out her discarded robes, and looked round to see what else was to be done, and came to the bedside to ask tersely if there was anything more my lady wanted, that my lady spoke.
"You'll come back and sit with me?" she asked.
"Ay--I'll come."
"Whose baby is that downstairs?"
"It's my girl's," said the old woman, startled somewhat at my lady's knowledge.
"Did she live through it?"
"Ay, she lived." And there was that in her tone which implied that it might have been better if she had not. But my lady's perceptions were blunted by her own sufferings.