And with that agreement, Archibald, indeed thoroughly exhausted and worn out, parted with his kind advisers and retired to his room, where he fell asleep in dreamy peace, and strange unwonted quiet, in the pleasant, ruddy twilight, which the fire made, as it glimmered in its shooting lights, and depths of fantastic shadow, through the familiar room.
The slight excitement of Archibald’s arrival over, Anne returned to the company, with Alice Aytoun’s song still ringing in her ear. Strange it was, how every passing event seemed to have some link of incoherent connection with Norman’s terrible history. The stranger child in Mrs. Melder’s cottage; the unconscious Alice; the magic threads were extending themselves in all directions. Anne almost feared to see new faces, to make new friends. Norman’s image was growing before her eyes, filling up the whole horizon of that dim future. If she should meet himself! the wandering Cain might, with a strange fascination, such as she had read of, seek his own birthplace, ere he died; the idea was fearful—a constant haunting dread, surrounding her like a mist wherever she went.
The evening wore on, and as the guests began to disperse, Anne, in virtue of her standing in the household, had various parting courtesies to pay; to stand at the hall door, while Mrs. Coulter’s carriage was packed with the many members of her family; to see Miss Falconer away, and Mrs. Bairnsfather; and when she returned to look for Lewis, the drawing-room was nearly empty. Lewis was not there, neither was Alice Aytoun. The door communicating with the little east room was ajar, and Anne entered, seeking her brother. The room was dimly lighted with one candle. Who stood at its further end? Lewis Ross and Alice Aytoun, hand in hand. Anne stood silent, on the threshold, in chill, fear and apprehension, her head bent forward, her eyes fixed upon them. Little Alice, drooping, blushing, leaning on her companion. Lewis, triumphant, proud, meeting his sister’s gaze with a smiling defiance. Anne stood still, seeing all, and could not speak. In another moment, Alice had glided towards her, thrown her slight arms round her waist, and was clinging to her like a child.
“Anne, be her sister,” said Lewis, with unusual emotion. Anne smiled a sickly smile, as in a painful dream, laid her hand unconsciously upon the girl’s fair hair, felt Alice start, and shiver at the touch of her cold fingers, and then, hastily disengaging herself, left the room, her very brain reeling, leaving Lewis enraged, and Alice grieved and alarmed, in the very fulness of her joy. It was all over now; the fatal engagement was made, and what remained but to blight the girlish gladness, and pour upon Lewis’s startled ears, the knowledge of that fatal crime, which stood like a spectre between his betrothed and him.
CHAPTER X.
LEWIS Ross and his sister walked home together in silence and alienation. Lewis was sullenly indignant, while Anne, still overpowered by that whirl of agitation, pain and fear, felt grateful for Duncan’s officious attendance with his lanthorn, which precluded any conversation of a private kind, between her brother and herself. In her first shock and bewilderment, she knew not what to do—whether to communicate her secret at once, or to delay until she herself knew the terrible story more perfectly. She determined on the latter course, before they reached Merkland, and pained still further by her brother’s averted looks, and sullen silence, whispered: “Lewis, forgive me, I knew not what I was doing,” as they entered the house. Lewis took no notice, but went angrily into the parlor, in which his mother usually sat. A fit of ill-humor had prevented Mrs. Ross from accompanying them to the Tower—the same cause had afflicted her with headache, and sent her to her room, full two hours before they returned home, and to Anne’s satisfaction, there was no family intercourse of any kind that night.
Once safe in the shelter of her own apartment, she sat through the dead hours of that chill January night, laboring to form some plan for her further proceedings. She could not concentrate her mind upon them—shooting off, now here, now there, those floods of distempered thoughts refused that bondage—now called back from a long and vivid picturing of Norman’s desolate and hopeless way, and Norman’s blighted life—now from recalling in strange caprice the girlish gaiety and sunny future of Alice Aytoun, dwelling upon its bright particulars, as if to exaggerate the gloom that now lowered over the gladness of those youthful days. The host of indefinite and conflicting purposes, which terminated all these discursive wanderings of thought, would not be reconciled. Crowding about her like so many phantoms, they even stifled the voice of her appeal to that One counsellor from whom it was Anne Ross’s constant wont to seek wisdom and guidance. Confused words, meaningless and often repeated, swelled up from her heart, constantly—a mere vacant cry of agony—for her mind was wandering all the while, from point to point, in aimless and bewildered speed.
With but the slight difference, that, for an hour or two, these confused thoughts, remaining as active as before, took upon them the yet more fantastic garb of dreams; her mind continued in the same state of excited agitation during the whole night, and it was only when the chill morning began to break, grey and faint, through the dark clouds of the east, that springing from her feverish sleep and unhappy fancies together, Anne girded herself for the work that lay before her. To see Mrs. Catherine, and ascertain beyond doubt that Alice was the daughter of that Aytoun who fell by Norman’s hand—that seemed her first step. To learn as fully and clearly as might be the particulars of the tragedy itself, and if possible, to get possession of Norman’s letter to her father, which Mrs. Ross had mentioned, and which, with foolish procrastination for which she now blamed herself, Anne had shrunk from seeking. If she had but accomplished these necessary preliminaries, Anne hoped that her mind might acquire more coherence, and that she might be able to resolve what was best to be done, for making known the secret to Alice and Lewis—the two individuals most deeply concerned.
Dressing herself hastily, she left Merkland, and took the path up Oranside, which led to the Tower. Anne was privileged to have admittance at all times, and knew that Mrs. Catherine was, comparatively, an early riser. The path was damp and slippery—the morning coming in, in clinging garments of wet mist, grey, drizzling and disconsolate, with blasts of thin rain, sweeping now and then in her face.
Mrs. Catherine was seated in her small dressing room, which was immediately over “the little room”—and like it looked out upon the bare ascent of the hill behind the Tower. She was dressed, all but the large soft grey shawl which her stately attendant Mrs. Elspeth Henderson was carefully unfolding; and seated in an easy chair by the fireside, was having her usual half-hour’s gossip with her “gentlewoman.”