Rhoda Fleming -- Volume 5

the family at their meals; pale, with the mournful rim about her eyelids, but a patient figure. No q

asked leave to be spared for a couple of hours, that he might attend the ceremonious interment of one to whom a sort of vagrant human sentiment of clanship

aster Gammon said solemnly, and he marched away in his

, as they were a favour, to be a blessing, except in the event of persons being buried alive. She tried to make her hearers understand that the idea of this calamity had always seemed intolerable to her, and told of numer

, too, does it not,

s taken with nervous chokings of alarm at the thought. "Alone-all dark! and hard wood upon your chest, your elbows, your nose,

y soon, mother

the time-you feeling, trying for air; it's the

You can only hate those who put you there. You see them taking tea, saying prayers, sleeping in bed, putting on bonnets,

d say she'd gone throug

mfit, t

t her eyes

Sumfit succumbed to a fit of resolution much u

a feather on my mouth; put a glass to my face, before you let

it burst out. "And looking so, as she s

ed her, and

e stifling! the hopeless cramp! Let us go and ga

ved them. The sight was convincing, but the shudder came again. In a frame less robust the brain would have given way. It was the very soundness of the brain which, when her blood was a simple tide of life in her veins, and no vital force, had condemned her to see the wisdom and the righteousness of the act of sacrifice committed by her, and had urged her even up to the altar. Then the sudden throwing off of the mask b

l insanity when they were alone together. Now, in the garden, Dahlia said: "All those flowers, my dear, have roots in mother and me. She can't feel them, for

cquiescingly as

know that. And there's an angel brings me one of mother's roses, and I smell it. I see fields of snow; and it's warm there, and no labour for breath.

give a smile for response; and Dahlia's intelligence being supe

t me tal

the blinding terror within her. Rhoda steadied her along the walks, praying for the time to come when her friends, the rector and his wife, might help in the task of comforting this poor sist

he preaching of an end that was promise of a beginning, and girdled a distancing land of trouble. The breeze that blew seemed mercy. To live here in forgetfulnes

t on the skirts of the funeral procession. Master Gammon, however, was no supporter of conjecture. What he had thought he had thought; but that was neither here nor there. He would swear to nothing that he had not touched;-eyes deceived;-he was never a guesser. He left Mrs. Sumfit to pledge herself in perturbation of spirit to an oath that her eyes had seen Anthony Hackbut; and more, which was, that after the close of th

ir to Master Gammon, with ent

, it was a stride for boots out o' London this morning. Your words, Mas' Gammon! and 'boots'-=it's true, if by that alone! For, 'boots,' I says to myself-he thinks by '

e farmer, with the ghost of old

head! but you shan't slip away, Mas' Gammon; no, try you ever so much. Drownded he was, and eight days in the sea, which you told me over a warm mug of ale by the fire years back. And I do believe them dumplings makes ye obstinate; for worse you get, and that fond of 'em, I sh'll soon not have enough in our biggest pot. Yes, you said he was eight days in the sea, and as for face, you said, poor thing! he was like a rag of towel dipped in starch, was your ow

had poured into her lap? Rhoda knew in a moment that she was near a great trial of her strength and truth. She had more than once, I cannot tell you how distantly, conceived that the money had been money upon which the mildest word for "stolen" should be put to express the feeling she had got about it, after she had parted with the bulk of it to the man Sedgett. Not "stolen," not "appropriated," but money that had perhaps been entrusted, and of which Anthony had forgotten

relieved, thinking it folly to have imagined her uncle was other than a man of hoarded wealth, and that he was here. But, in the interval, she had experienced emotions which warned her of a struggle to come. Who would be friendly to her, and an arm of might? The thought of the storm she had sown upon all sides made her tremble foolishly. When she placed her hand in Robert's, she gave his fingers a confiding pressur

hitherto, at least, nothing worse than sad disappointment. The man who was her sister's husband could no longer complain that he had been the victim of an imposition. She had bought his promise that he would leave the country, and she had rescued the honour of the family by paying him. At what cost? She asked herself that now, and then her self-support became uneven. Could her uncle have parted with the gr

ssure of her hand had cruelly resuscitated his longing for her. She drew back, wondering at the idleness of men-slaves while they want a woman's love, savages when they have won it. She

ire stopped him to speak with him. Anthony made his way on to the house. Shortly after, he was seen passing through the gates of the garden, accompanied by Rhoda. At the dinner-hour, Robert was taken aside by the farmer. Neither Rhoda nor Anthony presented themselves. They did not appear till nightfall. When Anthony came into the

ny?" the farmer t

by the musk-pots at the window, looking at Rhoda fixedly. Of t

," she sai

bed without a dinner, or your tea, and no supper! Y

he farmer's head, that Anthony prom

part, I do assure ye. If you're mixed up with that family, I won't bring it in you're anyways mixed up with this f

was; and Lord be thanked! I thought my eyes was failin'.

id the farmer. "Brother

recognizable, if her h

ell, ther

"How d' ye do-how d' ye do;" sounding like the first ef

smoke a pipe?-won't you tal

ng between pauses, elicited n

e Bank?" the farmer called out

sisted th

s tired; he is unwell. Tom

nding their crashing wheels. "Brother Tony, you speak out; has anybody been and broke? Never mind a blow, so long, o' course, as they haven't swallowed your money. How is it? Why, I never saw suc

er her uncle t

yes, mother, he shall have some warm tea upstairs

it. You said here 'd be a quiet place. I don't know about money. Try my pockets. Yes, mum, if you was forty policemen, I'm

s with m

eded in getting

phesied as much. He stiffened out his legs, and gave a manful spring, crying, "Hulloa, brother Tony! why, man, eh? Look here. What, goin' to be

rried An

a ship, and, blow and lighten, I defy you. Whereas we day-by-day people, if it do blow and if it do lighten, and the waves are avilanches, we've nothing to lose. Poor ol

this extent. Mrs. Sumfit dolorously said, "Often, William dear,"

, "save and store, only don'

" Mrs. Sumfit acted

oftly by the neck

?" Mrs. Sumfit murmured fondl

ill-luck, supposing; perchance, that Anthony was suffering from something more than a sentimental attac

mon, who was half an hour behind his time for bed, and had dropped asleep in his chair. This unusual display of public somnolence on Master Gammon's part

ift over the great, old-world eyes; upon which, like a clayey monster refusing to be informed with heavenly fire, he rolled to the right of his chair and to the left, and pitched forward, and insisted upon being inanimate. Brought at last to a condition of stale consciousn

foundering. And that's me: why didn't I go up and shake his hand, you ask. Well, why not? If he don't know he's welcome, without ceremony, he's no good. Why, I've got matters t' occupy my mind, too, haven't I? Every man has, and some more'n others, let alone crosses. There's something wrong with my brother-in-law, Tony, that's settled. Odd that we country people, who bide, and ta