"But you don't understand!" she cried. "No telegram can reach her to-night. It will only get to Carrigmore to-morrow morning—and from there to Orristown. If we were to give everything we have in the world—if we were to die for it—we could not save her from the blackness, the loneliness and horror of to-night!"
CHAPTER XX
Early on the morning that followed the storm, Clodagh stepped from the hall door of Orristown. As she stood on the gravelled pathway in the clear, strong daylight, she looked like one who has fought some terrible battle in the watches of the night, and who has been worsted in the encounter. She was pale and fragile, with a frightened query in her eyes, as though she had propounded some enormous question, to which Fate had as yet made no answer. For a time she stood in a helpless attitude, looking toward the green hill, crowned with sparsely foliaged trees, that fronted the house; then, seeming to take some vague resolution, she walked slowly forward towards the avenue, pausing where the gravelled pathway joined the fields.
There was a curious look upon the land and sea that morning, as though both were lying exhausted by the tumult of the night. All around beneath the avenue trees lay twigs and short splintered branches, to which the limp leaves, whipped to untimely death by the vehemence of the storm, still hung. Across the bay, as far as Carrigmore, the sea lay like a sleeping tiger that has prowled and harried through the dark hours of night, and now lies at rest. A wonderful pearly blue was upon the waters—long, rippling lines spread from headland to headland, like faintly pencilled shadows; but massed in a dark fringe along the curve of yellow strand was a ridge of packed seaweed, that held within its meshes a thousand evidences of the strife that had been, in twists of straw, pieces of broken cork, and long black chunks of driftwood.
She stood for an indefinite space, looking at this significant dark line standing out against the smoothness of the sand, until, half unconsciously, her attention was attracted by a sound that made itself audible from the direction of the gate, growing in volume as it advanced—the swish, swish of bare feet on soft ground. She turned from the vision of the sleeping sea, to behold a small peasant child in torn dress and dirty apron speeding up the drive.
The child neared her; then swerved away as if in fear, and continued her flight towards the house.
A sudden impulse seized Clodagh.
"Come here!" she called. "Where are you going?"
For an instant the child looked too frightened to speak; then her lips parted.
"Misther Asshlin—beyant at Carrigmore!" she said inarticulately; and, turning, she fled onward to the house.