Yes, indeed, in my heart I did know “the way he had gone.”
“O Moore,” I said to myself, “you are very naughty. It is really too bad. How I do wish I had been guided by Jocelyn’s advice!” and feeling decidedly angry as well as frightened—the one sensation seeming to increase instead of lessening the other—I hurried on.
My destination, I need scarcely say, was the door in the wall, and all the way thither I kept straining my eyes in the vain hope of seeing the boy’s figure emerging from the gathering gloom and coming to meet me. But no—I knew my point very accurately by now, and soon relaxed my pace, knowing that the door must be near at hand. And all the way from the Manor-house I had not met one living soul.
“It is a very lonely place,” I thought, with a little shiver of nervousness. “None of the roads near home are as deserted. I don’t think I should like to live all the year round in the North.”
Then a new fear struck me. What if the door should be locked—should have been locked after Moore had entered the grounds? for that he had done so I had no manner of doubt. What if that were the explanation of his non-appearance? What could I do?
But I did not allow myself to dwell on this cruel possibility, and in another moment it was set aside. I found the door, and it was unclosed!
Half my distress seemed to vanish with this discovery, though I grew more and more angry with my brother. Once inside, I stood still to consider, but not for long.
“He is sure to have gone to the left,” I said to myself. “All his curiosity was to peep into the house again, and he could only do so through the tonnelle and the long glass house;” so I crept along in the direction I decided upon, keeping close to the wall, between it and the shrubs which bordered it, as I have described, though it was now so dusky that my extreme precaution was scarcely called for. And before long I came to the passage between trees and bushes which we had lighted upon the last time.
It was not quite so dark here, for the real entrance to the tonnelle was a fairly wide one at the side, and I could still clearly see the glazed door at the other end. I stood still, gazing before me—then taking courage I advanced a few steps, still keeping my eyes fixed on the door through which I seemed to feel by instinct that the truant would make his way out. And I was not disappointed. As I approached the conservatory pretty closely, the door moved, softly and noiselessly. I would scarcely have noticed its doing so but for the faint glimmer of light on the glass panes of its upper part. And, peering cautiously to right and left, then gazing straight before him, stood the naughty boy!
It took all my self-command to repress an exclamation, but I did so, only whispering—and in the silence, unbroken save for the drip of the still rain-laden leaves, even a whisper sounded portentously audible—“Moore, come at once. Don’t you see me?”