“It was almost dusk,” she answered. “But his voice was a very pleasant and cultivated one. He was young, and I think good-looking. I was half inclined to ask him if he was a stranger in the neighbourhood or something of that sort, for I saw he had come down a path which only leads to the Grim House, though it wasn’t till the next day that we heard of the wonderful event. It was Strott, of course, who told me of it!”
“I wonder who he was!” I said thoughtfully. “It certainly makes the whole still more interesting if they are beginning to have any communication with the outside world.”
“There is one thing,” said Isabel, “that I forgot to tell you. They really must be good people, for on one occasion they did break through their rule of never leaving their own grounds. It was when little Tony at the vicarage fell off a haystack and they feared for his life; he was insensible for many hours, and his mother was in despair. That same afternoon the fly drove up to the vicarage, and, to Mrs Franklin’s astonishment, the Misses Grey were announced! She could scarcely believe her ears, and she has often told me that the very excitement of their coming did her good.”
“How very queer it is that you forgot to tell me of it before!” I could not help interrupting.
“I just did forget,” said Isabel calmly. “You see we are so used to the Grim House strangeness that it doesn’t strike us in the same way as it strikes you.”
“And what were they like?” I asked, “and what had they come for?”
“To express their sympathy, and find out if they could be of any use,” said Isabel. “Mrs Franklin was greatly touched. Of course their faces were quite familiar, but she had never heard their voices before. She said they were very, very gentle and apologetic, and pathetically timid. There were tears in their eyes, and they murmured something about being so fond of children, and that their own younger brother had had an accident as a boy, which had injured him lastingly. There was nothing they could do to help, though Mrs Franklin said she wished she could have invented something. She thanked them, of course, heartily, and the next day they sent down for news of Tony, by that time out of danger, and Mrs Franklin began to hope it would lead to some intercourse with these poor sad ladies. But no; the Grim House closed up again, and from that day to this they have never been seen except at church.”
“Then it appears that the only way to decoy them out of their den would be for some of you to get very ill, or have an accident or trouble of some kind,” I said rather thoughtlessly.
Isabel gave a little shiver.
“Don’t talk of such things!” she exclaimed. “I am afraid I am naturally rather cowardly. I don’t know if you have found that out yet, Regina? You mustn’t despise me for it. Margaret consoles me by saying that she thinks it was the effect on my nerves of mamma’s sudden death. I was such a little girl at the time, and it was so terribly sad—seeing her apparently quite well one evening, and being told the next morning that I should never see her again.”