"It is a very good horror. What a pity we shall never know those sentences that have been cut away," said Miss Fanshawe.
"That skull is worth sketching; won't you try it?" said Cleve.
"No, not for the world. I shall find it only too hard to forget it, and I don't mean to look at it again. Some countenances seize one with a tenacity and vividness quite terrible."
"Very true," said Cleve, with a meaning she understood, as he turned away with her. "We are not rich in wonders here, but the old church chest is worth seeing, it is curiously carved."
He led them towards a niche in which it is placed near the communion rails. But said Miss Sheckleton—
"I'm a little tired, Margaret; you will look at it, dear; and Mr. Verney will excuse me. We have been delving and hoeing all the morning, and I shall rest here for a few minutes." And she sat down on the bench.
Miss Margaret Fanshawe looked at her a little vexed, Cleve thought; and the young lady said—
"Hadn't you better come? It's only a step, and Mr. Verney says it is really curious."
"I'm a positive old woman," said cousin Anne, "as you know, and really a little tired; and you take such an interest in old carving in wood—a thing I don't at all understand, Mr. Verney; she has a book quite full of really beautiful drawings, some taken at Brussels, and some at Antwerp. Go, dear, and see it, and I shall be rested by the time you come back."
So spoke good-natured Miss Sheckleton, depriving Margaret of every evasion; and she accordingly followed Cleve Verney as serenely as she might have followed the verger.