As the night deepened the storm grew worse, and the howling of the wind through the cracks and crannies of the ancient building was like the noise of wild animals clamouring for food. Priscilla and Robin Clifford sat together in the kitchen,—the most comfortable apartment to be in on such an unkind night of elemental uproar. It had become more or less their living-room since Innocent's departure, for Robin could not bear to sit in the "best parlour," as it was called, now that there was no one to share its old-world charm and comfort with him,—and when Priscilla's work was done, and everything was cleared and the other servants gone to their beds, he preferred to bring his book and pipe into the kitchen, and sit in an old cushioned arm-chair on one side of the fire-place, while Priscilla sat on the other, mending the house-linen, both of them talking at intervals of the past, and of the happy and unthinking days when Farmer Jocelyn had been alive and well, and when Innocent was like a fairy child flitting over the meadows with her light and joyous movements, her brown-gold hair flying loose like a trail of sunbeams on the wind, her face blossoming into rose-and-white loveliness as a flower blossoms on its slender stem,—her voice carrying sweet cadences through the air and making music wherever it rang. Latterly, however, they had not spoken so much of her,—the fame of her genius and the sudden leap she had made into a position of public note and brilliancy had somewhat scared the simple soul of Priscilla, who felt that the child she had reared from infancy had been taken by some strange and not to be contested fate away, far out of her reach,—while Robin—whose experiences at Oxford had taught him that persons of his own sex attaining to even a mild literary celebrity were apt to become somewhat "touch-me-not" characters—almost persuaded himself that perhaps Innocent, sweet and ideally simple of nature as he had ever known her to be, might, under the influence of her rapid success and prosperity, change a little (and such change, he thought, would be surely natural!)—if only just as much as would lessen by ever so slight a degree her former romantic passion for the home of her childhood. And,—lurking sometimes at the back of all his thoughts there crept the suggestive shadow of "Amadis de Jocelyn,"—not the French Knight of old, but the French painter, of whom she had told him and of whose very existence he had a strange and secret distrust.
On this turbulent night the old kitchen looked very peaceful and home-like,—the open fire burned brightly, flashing its flame-light against the ceiling's huge oak beams—everything was swept clean and polished to the utmost point of perfection,—and the table on which Robin rested the book he was reading was covered with a tapestried cloth, embroidered in many colours, dark and bright contrasted cunningly, with an effect that was soothing and restful to the eyes. In the centre there was placed a quaintly shaped jar of old brown lustre which held a full tall bunch of golden-rod and deep wine-coloured dahlias,—a posy expressing autumn with a greater sense of gain than loss. Robin was reading with exemplary patience and considerable difficulty one of the old French poetry books belonging to the "Sieur Amadis de Jocelin," and Priscilla's small glittering needle flew in and out the open-work stitchery of a linen pillow-slip she was mending as deftly as any embroideress of Tudor times. Over the old, crabbed yet delicately fine writing of the "Sieur" whose influence on Innocent's young mind had been so pronounced and absolute, and in Robin's opinion so malign, he pored studiously, slowly mastering the meaning of the verses, though written in a language he had never cared to study. He was conscious of a certain suave sweetness and melancholy in the swing of the lines, though they did not appeal to him very forcibly.
"En un cruel orage
On me laisse perir;
En courant au naufrage
Je vois chacun me plaindre et mil me secourir,
Felicite passee
Qui ne peux revenir
Tourment de ma pensee
Que n'ai-je en te perdant perdu le souvenir!
Le sort, plein d'injustice
M'ayant enfin rendu
Ce reste un pur supplice,
Je serais plus heureux si j'avais tout perdu!"
A sudden swoop of the wind shook the very rafters of the house as though some great bird had grasped it with beak and talons, and Priscilla stopped her swift needle, drawing it out to its full length of linen thread and holding it there. A strange puzzled look was on her face—she seemed to be listening intently. Presently, taking off her spectacles, she laid them down, and spoke in a half whisper:
"Mister Robin! Robin, my dear!"
He looked up, surprised at the grave wistfulness and wonder of her old eyes.
"Yes, Priscilla?"
"I'm thinkin' my time is drawin' short, dear lad!" she said, slowly—"I've got a call, an' I'll not be much longer here! That's a warnin' for me—"
"A warning? Priscilla, what do you mean?"
Drawing in her needle and thread, she pricked it through the linen she held and looked full at him.