A Dark Night's Work

ther even less than usual, although not less friendly when they did meet. But to Ellinor the visit was one of unmixed happiness. Hitherto she had always had a little fear mingled up with her

over had not forgotten his ambition in his love. He tried to inoculate her with something of his own craving for success in life; but it was all in vain: she n

hen a child. Miss Monro objected a little to this caprice of Ellinor's, saying that it was too early for out-of-door meals; but Mr. Corbet overruled all objections, and helped her in her gay preparations. She always kept to the early hours of her childhood, although she, as then, regularly sat with her father at his late dinner; and this meal al fresco was to be a reality to her and Miss Monro. There was a place arranged for her father, and she seized upon him as he was coming from the stable-yard, by the shrubbery path, to his study, and with merry playfulness made him a prisoner, accusing him of disappointing them of their ride, and drawing him more than half unwilling, to his chair by the table. Bu

l that hot sun's rays come on this turf. I

sorry to spoil the little party. He walked up and down the gravel walk, clos

r now, papa?"

at place that seems so chilly and

back to their rather grey and dreary aspect; but Ellinor was too happy to feel this much, knowing what abs

Mr. Livingstone on many little points of interest which they found they had in common: church music, and the difficulty they had in getting people to sing in parts; Salisbury Cathedral, which they had both seen; styles of church architecture, Ruskin's works, and parish schools, in which Mr. Livingstone was somewhat shocked to find that Ellinor took no great interest. When the gentleman came in from the dining-room, it struck Ellinor, for the first time in her life, that her father had taken more wine than was good for him. Indeed, this had rather become a habit with him of late; bu

bewitching, irresistible. He dreamed of her all night, and wakened up the next morning to a calculation of how far his income would allow him to furnish his pretty new parsonage with that crowning blessing, a wife. For a day or two he did up little sums, and sighed, and

e name "Herbert Livingstone," the meaning of the letter flashed upon her and she coloured all over. She put the letter away, unread, for a few minutes, and then made some excuse for leaving the room and going upstairs. When safe in her bed-chamber, she read the young man's eager words with a sense of self-reproach. How must she, engaged to one man, have been behaving to another, if this was the result of a single evening's interview? The self-reproach was unjustly bestowed; but with that we have nothing to do. She made herself very miserable; and at last went down with a heavy heart to go on with Dante, and rummage up words in the dictionary. All the time she seemed to Miss Monro to be plodding on with her Italian more diligently and sedately than usual, she was planning in her own mind to speak to her father as soon as he returned (and he had said that he should not be late), and beg him to undo the mischief she had done by seeing Mr. Livingstone the next morning, and frankly explaining the real state of affairs to him. But she wanted to read he

ry's" (the Hamley brewer), thought Ellinor. "But how provoking t

e motive for Mr. Dunster's visits. Mr. Wilkins always seemed to be annoyed by his coming at so late an hour, and spoke of it, resenting the intrusion upon his leisure; and Ellinor, without consideration, adopted her father's mode of speaking and thinking on the subject, and was rather more angry than he was whenever the obnoxious partner came on business in the evening. This night was, of all

open; some one went out, and then there were hurried footsteps along the shrubbery-path. She thought, of course, that it was Mr. Dunster leaving the house; and went back for Mr. Livingstone's letter. Having found it, she passed through her father's room to the private staircase, thinking that if she went by the more regular way, she would have run the risk of disturbing Miss Monro, and perhaps of being questioned in the morning. Even in passing down this remote staircase, she trod softly for fear of being overheard. When she entered the room, the full light of the candles dazzled her for an instant, coming out of the darkness. They were flaring wildly in the draught that came in through the open door, by which the outer air was admitted; for a moment there seemed no one in the room, and then she saw, with strange sick horror, the legs of some one lying on the carpet behind the table. As if compelled, even while she shrank from doing it, she went round to see who it was that lay there, so still and motionless as never to stir at her sudden coming. It was Mr. Dunster; his head propped on chair-cushions, his eyes open, staring, distended. There was a strong smell of brandy and hartshorn in the room; a smell so powerful as not to be neutralized by the free current of night air that blew through the two open doors. Ellinor could not have told whether it was reason or instinct that made her act as she did during this awful night. In thinking of it afterwards, with shuddering avoidance of the haunting memory that would come and overshadow her during many, many years of her life, she grew to believe that the powerful smell of the spilt brandy absolutely intoxicated her-an unconsc

ng some one behind him by his recoil, on seeing his

has brought you here?"

one stupefied, "I do

child; it can

pitying, awe-stricken face behind h

d?" she as

beyed, and looked with an intensity of eagerness almost amounting to faintness on the experiment, and yet he could not hope. The flame was steady-steady and pitilessly unstirred, even when it was adjusted close to mouth and nostril; the he

ood by his master, looked sadly on the dead man, whom, living, none of them had

ather?" at len

so adjured by her eyes in the very presence of death, he could not choose b

-I can't tell how it was. He must have hit his head in falling. Oh, my God! one litt

ing behind Mr. Dunster's head, she t

me good?" she asked of Di

d in his pockets as he spoke, and, as chance would it, the "fleam" (or cattle lancet) was somewhere about his dress. He drew it out, smoothed and tried it on his finger. Ellinor tried to bare the arm, but turned sick as she did so. Her father started eagerly forwards, and did what was necessary with hurried trembling hands. If they had

t was carried back to them by the sense of charge and protection which the servant's presence of min

e. What was

coming into her mind that all might be concealed somehow; she did not know how, nor did she think of any consequences ex

the unspoken echo of his own last words, that went booming through his h

tumblerful of raw spirit from the b

no harm; only bring back his senses, which, poor gentleman, are scared away. We shall need a

m off. I did not want to talk of business; I had taken too much wine to be very clear and some things at the office were not quite in order, and he had found it out. If a

here. One can't say. But don't you think, miss, as he's neither kith nor kin to miss him, we might just bury him away before morning, somewhere? There's better nor four hours of dark. I wish we could put him i' the churchyard, but that can't be; but, to my mind, the sooner we set

either for a minute or s

inal; and you, Ellinor? Dixon, you are right. We must conceal it, or I must cut my t

t in search of tools; Ellinor following them, shivering all over, but begg

She made herself busy with carrying heavy baskets of turf, and straining her

lash of hope came across her. Could he be reviving? She entered, but a moment was enough to

brandy, which Ellinor, reassured by the apparently good effect of the first dose, brought to him without a word; and once at h

the rest must be done by them alone. She felt that it must; and indeed both her nerves and her bodily strength were giving way. She would have kissed her fathe

t never kiss me aga

eck, and covering his face with kisses. "I love you, and I don't care what you are, if

soon be daylight. What a blessing there are no rooms on one side of the house. Go, Nelly." And she went; straining herself u

time of the year of which I am speaking, so closely precedes the dawn. She could discern the tops of the trees against the sky, and could single out the well-known one, at a little distance from the stem of which the grave was made, in the very p

terrible interpretation to Ellinor's ears. Before they had ended, the little birds had begun

e intense weary physical pain which took off something of the anguish of t

ctively creep between the blankets; and, o