United States or Kiribati ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
To-morrow, Miss Sally promised, Farmer Tossell should be as good as his word, and ride them over to Culvercoombe, where perhaps she might have a few more questions to put to them. For the present she and Mr. Chichester had enough to talk over. The interview had lasted a good hour, and Arthur Miles was glad to regain his liberty. The boy's manner had been polite enough, but constrained.
She was yet further annoyed when he joined her there, ten minutes later, and appeared to pay small attention, if he listened at all, to her plans for to-morrow, before the ride to Culvercoombe. There could be no more nettle-clearing to-day. Dusk was gathering fast, and in another hour the moon would rise. So back once more they fared, to find Mrs.
But Tossell has promised to bring the children to Culvercoombe in the early afternoon, and this will give you an excuse to be present. Some questions may occur to you between this and then; and, anyway, I'd like to have you handy." No more was said. They parted, having come to a point where the rising moon showed their paths lying separate across the moor. Their lonely homes lay eight miles apart.
They had almost reached the entrance gate of Culvercoombe before he reduced the affronted horse to a trot, and Doctor Glasson, who had been clutching the rail of the dog-cart in acutest physical terror, had no nerve as yet to resume the conversation. A couple of aged mastiff bitches mothers in their time, and now great-grandmothers, of a noble race lay sunning themselves before the house-porch.
You guess now why Tilda carries a spade, and what has happened, but may care to know how it happened. Sir Elphinstone is paying a visit just now to Culvercoombe. He regards Tilda with mixed feelings, and Tilda knows it. The knowledge nettles her a little and amuses her a good deal.
At the end of that time, however, he saw the barouche roll past the cross-roads towards Fair Anchor. The coast was clear. So, wondering a little at the farmer's delay, he wended his way back to Culvercoombe. To his amazement, in the hall he ran against Butts carrying a portmanteau, and at the same moment Miss Sally issued from the yellow drawing-room with a Bradshaw in her hand.
He left his bride at once, and posted up to Meriton for the funeral, arriving just in time; and there I saw him, for we all happened to be at Culvercoombe for the shooting, and women used to attend funerals in those days. . . . No one knew of the marriage; but that same evening he rode over to Culvercoombe, asked for a word with me in private, and told me the whole story pluckily enough, I am bound to say.
The time is seven years later seven years and a half, rather; the season, spring; the hour, eight in the morning; and the place, a corner of Culvercoombe, where Miss Sally's terraced garden slopes to meet the wild woodland through an old orchard billowy overhead with pink and white blossom and sheeted underfoot with blue-bells.
But I may tell you, sir, that Sir Miles has a very high opinion of Miss Sally, as I happen to know." "We all have, Matters. . . . Well, I have what I came for, and will be driving back to Culvercoombe with it. So good day, and thank you!" "I thank you, sir." Mr. Matters bowed.
Between them you catch a glimpse of the Bristol Channel, blue-grey beyond a notch of the distant hills. She pauses here for a look. The moors that stretch for miles on all sides of Culvercoombe are very silent this sunny morning. It is the season when the sportsman pauses and takes breath for a while, and neither gun nor horn is abroad.
Word Of The Day