Lovel strove to speak, but, as usual in such cases, he could not utter a word. His tongue refused its office. The awful figure held up a warning finger, and then began deliberately to unclasp the volume he held in his hands. He turned the leaves hastily for a few minutes; then, holding the book aloft in his left hand, he pointed with his right to a line which seemed to start forth from the page glowing with supernatural fire. Lovel did not understand the language in which the book was printed, but the wonderful light with which the words glowed impressed them somehow on his memory. The vision shut the volume. A strain of music was heard, and Lovel awoke. The sun was shining full into the Green Room, and somewhere not far away a girl's voice was singing a simple Scottish air.
INTERLUDE OF WARNING
It was the spinner of yarns himself who broke the silence which fell on the party at the close of the first tale told out of the treasure-house of The Antiquary.
"If I catch you," were the words of warning which fell from his lips, "you, Hugh John, or you, Toady Lion, trying to hoist one another up a cliff with a rope and a chair—well, the rope will most certainly be used for quite another purpose, and both of you will just hate to look at a chair for a fortnight after! Do you understand?"
They understood perfectly.
"It was me they were going to hoist," confided Maid Margaret, coming a little closer. "I saw them looking at me all the time you were telling the story!"
"Well," I said, "just let me catch them at it, that's all!"
This caution being necessary for the avoidance of future trouble, I went on to read aloud the whole of the Storm chapters, to the children's unspeakable delight. Hugh John even begged for the book to take to bed with him, which privilege he was allowed, on the solemn promise that he would not "peep on ahead." Since Sweetheart's prophecies as to Die Vernon, such conduct has been voted scoundrelly and unworthy of any good citizen of the nursery.
On the whole, however, I could not make out whether The Antiquary promised to be a favourite or not. The storm scene was declared "famous," but the accompanying prohibition to break their own or their family's necks, by pulling chairs up and down rocks, somewhat damped the ardour of the usual enthusiasts.
As, however, the day was hopeless outside, the snow beating more and more fiercely on the windows, and hanging in heavy fleecy masses on the smallest twigs of the tree-branches and leafless rose stems, it was decided that nothing better could be imagined, than just to proceed with our second tale from The Antiquary. But before beginning I received two requests, somewhat difficult to harmonize the one with the other.