A shriek—an agonized shriek—broke from Lady Maude. In her suspense she had stolen out unperceived, and lifted the covering of the rude bier, now resting on the steps. The rays of the hall-lamp fell on the face, and Maude, in her anguish, with a succession of hysterical sobs, came shivering back to sink down at her mother's feet.
"Oh, my love—my love! Dead! dead!"
The only one who heard the words was Anne Ashton. The countess-dowager caught the last.
"Who is dead? What is this mystery?" she asked, unceremoniously lifting her satin dress, with the intention of going out to see, and her head began to nod—perhaps with apprehension—as if she had the palsy. "You want to force us away. No, thank you; not until I've come to the bottom of this."
"Let us tell them," cried young Carteret, in his boyish impulse, "and then perhaps they will go. An accident has happened to Lord Hartledon, ma'am, and these men have brought him home."
"He—he's not dead?" asked the old woman, in changed tones.
Alas! poor Lord Hartledon was indeed dead. The Irish labourers, in passing near the mill, had detected the body in the water; rescued it, and brought it home.
The countess-dowager's grief commenced rather turbulently. She talked and shrieked, and danced round, exactly as if she had been a wild Indian. It was so intensely ludicrous, that the occupants of the hall gazed in silence.
"Here to-day, and gone to-morrow!" she sobbed. "Oh—o—o—o—o—o—oh!"
"Nay," cried young Carteret, "here to-day, and gone now. Poor fellow! it is awful."