For while they were being uttered, his hearers might see a long line of fire rise into the air from the shore of the bay near Mousehole, denoting the flight of a rocket.
"That is the way they amuse us almost every night," continued the chaplain. "'Tis too dark, I suppose, to see anything afloat. Let us put the candles in the shade, and look."
So said, so done. Fruitlessly, for they could discover nothing on the dark waters. But while they were gazing across the bay, a faint, rushing sound fell on their ear, above the noise of the sea; and, turning hastily, they perceived the last sparks of a second rocket, which had been fired from their own coast.
"Yes, that is the way," Polydore repeated. "Of old, the folks would just have wished the smuggler luck, and perhaps turned out in hope to run a keg or so; but they seem to think there's more in these signals now."
"And you feel no alarm yourself, my dear sir?" Helen inquired.
"None, Helen," replied the chaplain. "I may be mistaken, but I do not expect to see Jeffrey's blunderbuss brought into action; and I have a trust which never yet proved wanting."
So saying, Polydore rang the bell, a summons which speedily assembled all the household for family prayer, according to old usage; and when the rite was over, the members sought their respective resting-places, and silence reigned in the castle.
But Randolph could not sleep. Throwing a cloak around him, and shading his lamp with his hand, he proceeded with the stealthy step of one who dreads he knows not what, along the desolate corridors to the state apartments. Through their faded grandeur he wandered on, until he reached the great chamber which was the scene of his father's death. He placed his light so that only a faint glimmer fell upon the bed, and leant against one of the pillars, and resumed his reverie of the afternoon with such vividness of imagination, that he fancied he again beheld the bright eyes of the dying man, and heard the injunctions which seemed now to separate him from what he held dearest upon earth. But his reverie had not terminated with those gloomy forebodings, nor did his dream. A frail and slender form, veiled in gossamer-like drapery, bent dimly over the couch for a short space and floated away, beckoning him to follow. It rested a moment in the doorway, for he had only obeyed the sign with his eyes. But when he hastily seized the lamp, it flitted fast before him, fading and fading away, until it disappeared entirely as he crossed the threshold of his own chamber. He flung himself on his bed, and closed his eyes for sleep; and as the last gleam of consciousness vanished, a face which he appeared to have known in days long past, meek and lovely,—that of a woman, in her morning of beauty,—bent down upon his, and kissed his lips.
The kiss seemed yet fresh upon them when he woke, and found the sun shining gaily into the apartment.