I had peeped at him: a white cloth steeped in vinegar and water was folded round his head; his great eyes were closed, so were his marble lips; his figure straight, thin, and long, dressed in a white dressing-gown, looked like a corpse 'laid out' in the bed; his gaunt bandaged arm lay outside the sheet that covered his body.
With this awful image of death we kept our vigil, until poor Milly grew so sleepy that old Wyat proposed that she should take her place and watch with me.
Little as I liked the crone with the high-cauled cap, she would, at all events, keep awake, which Milly could not. And so at one o'clock this new arrangement began.
'Mr. Dudley Ruthyn is not at home?' I whispered to old Wyat.
'He went away wi' himself yesternight, to Cloperton, Miss, to see the wrestling; it was to come off this morning.'
'Was he sent for?'
'Not he.'
'And why not?'
'He would na' leave the sport for this, I'm thinking,' and the old woman grinned uglily.
'When is he to return?'