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Very pink and white cheeks she had, very black glossy hair and bright eyes fat, bold, and rather cross, she looked and in her bold way she examined us curiously as we passed. I mistook the situation. It had once happened before that an intending visitor at Knowl had entered the place by that park-road, and lost several hours in a vain search for the house.
But lawk! how grand she is, with her black silk, cloak and crape, and I only in twilled cotton, and rotten old Coburg for Sundays. Odds! it's a shame; but you'll be tired, you will. It's a smartish pull, they do say, from Knowl. I know a spell of it, only so far as the "Cat and Fiddle," near the Lunnon-road. Come up, will you? Would you like to come in first and talk a bit wi' the governor?
'I met' I could not say my cousin 'I met him, uncle your son that young gentleman I saw him, I should say, at Church Scarsdale, and afterwards with some other persons in the warren at Knowl. It was the night our gamekeeper was beaten. 'Well, Dudley, what do you say to that? asked Uncle Silas. 'I never was at them places, so help me.
But when we reached the old bridge, with the tall osiers standing by the buttress, and looked back at poor Knowl the places we love and are leaving look so fairy-like and so sad in the clear distance, and this is the finest view of the gabled old house, with its slanting meadow-lands and noble timber reposing in solemn groups I gazed at the receding vision, and the tears came at last, and I wept in silence long after the fair picture was hidden from view by the intervening uplands.
Again I burst into wild entreaty, and, clasping her fast, poured forth my supplications with the bitterness of death. 'I have no confidence in you, little Maud; you are little rogue petite traîtresse! Reflect, if you can, how you 'av always treat Madame. You 'av attempt to ruin me you conspire with the bad domestics at Knowl to destroy me and you expect me here to take a your part!
Tom was silent, while with a vacant gape he watched the spin of his half-crown twice, and then catching it with a smack in his hand, which he thrust into his pocket, he said, still looking in the same direction 'I never rid postilion in my days, ma'am. I know nout o' sich a place, though 'appen I maught a' bin there; Knowl, ye ca't.
They fancied that she was making good her footing with 'the Master; and that she would then oust Mrs. Rusk perhaps usurp her place and so make a clean sweep of them all. I fancy the honest little housekeeper did not discourage that suspicion. About this time I recollect a pedlar an odd, gipsified-looking man called in at Knowl.
Sometimes she had accesses of a sort of hilarity which frightened me still more than her graver moods, and I will describe these by-and-by. There is not an old house in England of which the servants and young people who live in it do not cherish some traditions of the ghostly. Knowl has its shadows, noises, and marvellous records.
Events of this kind made no difference with my father; but every other face in Knowl was gladdened by the removal. My energies had returned, my spirits were come again. The sunlight was happy, the flowers innocent, the songs and flutter of the birds once more gay, and all nature delightful and rejoicing.
She was anxious to persuade my uncle to relinquish his guardianship to her; but the evening of the funeral a black-bordered letter came from him, bidding me remain at Knowl until he could arrange for my journey to him. There was a postscript, which made my cheek tingle. "Pray present my respects to Lady Knollys, who, I understand, is sojourning at Knowl.