She rose as she spoke, confronting the two young men. “Who are you?” she repeated; “speak, or begone, and trouble me not.”
“I beg your pardon for entering without leave,” said Algernon; “but the rain is coming down so heavily that we should have been wet through in another minute, and there is no other shelter at hand.”
“That’s no answer to my question,” she exclaimed. “What care I for rain or storm; let the lightning flash and the thunder roar, and do its worst. Go your way, I say, and leave me to my solitude.”
“My brother would suffer should he get wet,” said Harry, stepping in. “And I must beg you, my good lady, not to be annoyed if we remain till the storm is over; it will probably pass away in half an hour, and we beg not to interrupt you in what you are about.”
“You are fair spoken, young sir, but you have not answered my question. Who are you, I ask again?”
“We are the sons of Sir Ralph Castleton, and we discovered your hut by chance, while looking for a place to obtain shelter from the rain.”
“Spawn of the viper, how dare ye come hither to seek for shelter beneath my roof?” exclaimed the woman in a voice which made the young men start, so shrill and fierce did it sound, high above the roar of the thunder, the howling of the wind, and the pattering of the rain.
“A fit time ye have chosen to come and mock at me; but I have powers at my command to overwhelm you in a moment. See, the heavens fight on my side.”
As she spoke a bright flash of lightning darted down the glen, which, with the crashing peal of thunder that followed, made the horses snort and plunge so violently, that Harry had no little difficulty in holding them, and was drawn out from the doorway in which he had been standing.
“And you deem yourself the heir of Texford,” she continued in the same tone, gazing with her wild eyes intently fixed on Algernon. “Though you rejoice in youth and wealth, I see death stamped on your brow; and before many months have passed away, instead of dwelling in your proud and lordly hall, you will have become a tenant of the silent tomb. I can command the elements, and can read the future. It was I who summoned this storm to drive you hither that you might hear your fate, that fate which the stars last night revealed to me. Ah! ah! ah! you now wish that you had passed by instead of seeking shelter beneath my roof; but your destiny drove you hither, and against that you fight in vain.”