Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 22, 2025
Not that such an idea could get possession of a mind so well fortified, at the first assault; but it was strange how often the thought came back to her that the man who had thrilled through all those people about Prickett's Lane a kind of vague sense that they were Christians, and not hopeless wretches, forgotten of God; and who had taken in the mysterious lodger at Mrs Hadwin's, bearing the penalty of suspicion without complaint, would be true at his post wherever he might be, and was a priest of God's appointing.
He had to say it aloud to convince himself of the fact; for it was hard, after being clandestine for half a lifetime, to move about freely in the daylight. As for Mr Wentworth, he fixed his eyes full on the new-comer's face. "I want to know if Rosa has come home," he repeated, in the clearest tones of his clear voice. "I am told she called at Mrs Hadwin's half an hour ago. Has she come back?"
I wish you would be frank with me, and tell me what it is." This appeal had brought them to Mrs Hadwin's door, which the Curate opened with his key before he answered his brother. The old lady herself was walking in the garden in a state of great agitation, with a shawl thrown over the best cap, which she had put on in honour of the stranger.
He had found out by practical experiments, almost for the first time, that there were more things in earth and heaven than are dreamt of in the philosophy of youth. It was the next morning after this when Mrs Hadwin's strange lodger first appeared in the astonished house.
He had been waiting at Mrs Hadwin's for the last two hours. He had seen that worthy woman's discomposed looks, and felt that she did not shake her head for nothing. Jack had been the bugbear of the family for a long time past. Gerald was conscious of adding heavily at the present moment to the Squire's troubles. Charley was at Malta, in indifferent health; all the others were boys.
I perceived that the house had no inhabitant besides the two females and the old man. I went in search of the latter, and found him crouched, as before, at the kitchen-fire, smoking his pipe. I placed myself on the same bench, and entered into conversation with him. I gathered from him that he had, for many years, been Mr. Hadwin's servant.
I did not go off, however, without rifling his drawer of some hundreds of dollars, which he had laid up against a rainy day. I was noted for such pranks, and was hated by all the neighbours for my pride and laziness. It was easy, by comparison of circumstances, for Ellis to ascertain that Hadwin's servant Mervyn was the same against whom such heavy charges were laid.
The first sound he heard on entering Mrs Hadwin's garden was the clear notes of the stranger's whistle among the trees; and with an impatient exclamation Mr Wentworth sought his fellow-lodger, who was smoking as usual, pacing up and down a shaded walk, where, even in daylight, he was pretty well concealed from observation.
From where he sat in the green room, he whistled so beautifully that Mrs Hadwin's own pet canary paused astonished to listen, and the butcher's boy stole into the kitchen surreptitiously to try if he could learn the art; and while he whistled, he filled the tidy room with parings and cuttings of wood, and carved out all kinds of pretty articles with his knife.
Nothing happened in the quiet road, where there were scarcely any passengers, and the poor lady arrived with a trembling sense of escape from unknown perils at Mrs Hadwin's garden-door. For Miss Dora was of opinion, like some few other ladies, that to walk alone down the quietest of streets was to lay herself open to unheard-of dangers.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking