Evening was now rapidly closing in; great folds of gray shadow seemed to come broadening over the landscape; not a sound was heard but the faint whiz of some tiny gnats.
Suddenly the clear chimes began to play from the slender ball-topped tower, which stood out black, like a monstrous ninepin, against the yellow western sky. The eyes of the watchers met. Eight slow strokes came trembling heavily across the hush of sunset. At the other end of the long, straight road a figure appeared, as yet quite indistinct. They watched. They could hear each other’s hearts beat.
When it drew nearer they saw that it was a woman. Harriet gave a great gasp of relief. A moment later it had come quite close to them. And both saw simultaneously that the woman wore a white feather and a scarlet shawl.
She passed them suspiciously; she was an independent-looking, weather-beaten female of some forty wintry winters—all angles and frost. After a moment she halted, and hesitatingly retraced her steps.
The last glow paled away from the horizon. In the ashen grayness it even seemed to Ursula that the little breeze from the marshes blew cold. The long road lay motionless, gradually shortening into night.
“A fine evening, young ladies,” said the red-shawled female, stopping abruptly near them, and suddenly opening an enormous parasol; “but it’s getting late.”
“It’s not much beyond eight,” replied Ursula, for want of an answer.
“Nine minutes,” said the female, with precision. “Nine full minutes past 8 P.M. Perhaps I may remark to you, ladies, that this spot is unhealthy after sunset—very particularly unhealthy. The back-sillies, as modern science calls them, come up from the water and produce injurious smells. If I were you I should be careful—very particularly careful.” She turned on one heel, but suddenly bethought herself.
“I,” she said, nodding her head—the white feather waved—“am compelled by the call of duty to remain. I am waiting for some one—an engagement.” She spoke the last word with triumphant pomposity. Its double meaning evidently furnished her extreme satisfaction. She repeated it twice, and jingled a small reticule depending from a cotton-gloved wrist.
“I know of a case,” she went on immediately, seeing that neither girl moved or spake, “when a young person (much of your age) spent an evening out here in this wood. Her reasons for doing so I distinctly decline to enter into. They were not laudable, you may be sure; no young girl’s would be. Well, she caught the myasthma and died. She died.”