"So say I," spoke Nancy Tomson. "When once a thing o' this kind es led up to by dreams, it won't stop at the beginning. They dreams es strange indexes sometimes, and Mr. Blase Pellet there didna heve his for nothing. Without that dream the poor man might just heve laid on in thaat shaaft as he faalled, and never been found i' this world."
Mr. Blase Pellet, listening to this, shot a glance of intense aggravation at the speaker. Rosaline looked up at him. It was a steady gaze this time, and one that betrayed unqualified contempt.
"Was it a very bad dream?" asked his relative from Falmouth, this being the first opportunity she had had of questioning Blase upon the subject.
"Bad enough," shortly replied Pellet; and, with the words, he made a sudden détour to the front-door, and took up his standing outside in the sunshine.
The movement led to a general dispersion. Nancy Tomson and the other neighbours departed; Mrs. Pellet went upstairs; Dame Bell passed into the back-kitchen to see about their own and her lodgers' dinner: for the ordinary day's work must go on even on the saddest occasions; and Rosaline remained in the room alone.
"I am very sorry I had that dream."
Lifting her eyes, Rosaline saw the speaker beside her—Blase Pellet.
"So am I," she shortly answered, in a significant way, that certainly gave him no encouragement to proceed.
"And still more sorry that I spoke of it abroad, Rosaline: for I see that it is giving you pain."
"Pain!" she ejaculated, a whole world of anguish in her tone: ay, and of resentment also.