“The Lord pity you, you stony-hearted creature!” murmured the sympathetic old lady to herself as the door closed between them. “One word wouldn’t have cost you much, Heaven knows, it’s mightly little comfort poor old master 107 takes with you! You are no more like the bonny race of Hurlhursts than a raven is like a white dove!” And the poor old lady walked slowly back to the dark-robed figure in the hall, so eagerly awaiting her.
“There was no use in my going to my young mistress; I knew she would not see you. But I suppose you are more satisfied now.”
“She utterly refuses to see me, does she,” asked the woman, in an agitated voice, “when you told her I wished to see her particularly?”
The housekeeper shook her head.
“When Miss Pluma once makes up her mind to a thing, no power on earth could change her mind,” she said; “and she is determined she won’t see you, so you may as well consider that the end of it.”
Without another word the stranger turned and walked slowly down the path and away from Whitestone Hall.
“Fool that I was!” she muttered through her clinched teeth. “I might have foreseen this. But I will haunt the place day and night until I see you, proud heiress of Whitestone Hall. We shall see––time will tell.”
Meanwhile Mrs. Corliss, the housekeeper, was staring after her with wondering eyes.
“I have heard that voice and seen that face somewhere,” she ruminated, thoughtfully; “but where––where? There seems to be strange leaks in this brain of mine––I can not remember.”
A heavy, halting step passed the door, and stopped there.