“After a long conference, he came to me with grave looks.
“‘She is at the window this day,’ he said, shaking his head sorrowfully, when I had told him my share of the last night’s singular experiences. ‘The pale lady is there; I saw her as I came by the bridge as plainly as now I see you. We shall have evil tidings of that poor lad before nightfall, or I am strangely mistaken.’
“Evil tidings indeed they were that reached us on the return of some of the exploring-party. They were first attracted from following as nearly as they could the line of road, blocked as it was with drifts of snow by hearing the howling of a dog at some little distance, in the direction of the precipitous ravine which went by the name of ‘Armstrong’s Clough.’ Following the sound, they came upon traces of wheels in the hill-side, where no carriage could have gone had it not been for the deep snow which concealed and smoothed away the inequalities of the ground. These marks were traced here and there till they led to the verge of the precipice, where a struggle had evidently taken place, and masses of snow had been dislodged and fallen into the ravine.
“Looking below, the only thing they could see in the waste of snow was a little dog, who was known to be in the habit of running with the post-horses from ——, which was scraping wildly in the snow and filling the air with its dismal howlings. A considerable circuit had to be made before the bottom of the clough could be reached, and then the whole tragedy was revealed. There lay the broken carriage, the dead horses, and two stiffened corpses under the snow, that had drifted over and around them.
“I need not pursue the melancholy story; I was an old fool for telling it to you,” said the Doctor.
“But Miss Collingham—what became of her?” asked an eager listener.
“Well, she did not recover,” answered the Doctor with a slight trembling in his voice. “It was a sad matter altogether; and within a short time she lay beside her betrothed in the family vault below the chapel. Sir James broke up his establishment and went abroad, and I never saw any of the family again.”
“And what did you do, Doctor?”
“I went to London, to seek my fortune as best I might; and I hope you may all prosper as well, my young friends.”
“And is it all really true?” asked Amy, who had listened with breathless attention.