hat inclement signal I remembered I
was due elsewhere.

CHAPTER XXVI

THE COTTAGE AT NIGHT

At the door I was nearly blown back by the unbridled violence of the
squall, and Rowley and I must shout our parting words. All the way along
Princes Street (whither my way led) the wind hunted me behind and
screamed in my ears. The city was flushed with bucketfuls of rain that
tasted salt from the neighbouring ocean. It seemed to darken and lighten
again in the vicissitudes of the gusts. Now you would say the lamps had
been blown out from end to end of the long thoroughfare; now, in a lull,
they would revive, re-multiply, shine again on the wet pavements, and
make darkness sparingly visible.

By the time I had got to the corner of the Lothian Road there was a
distinct improvement. For one thing, I had now my shoulder to the wind;
for a second, I came in the lee of my old prison-house, the Castle; and,
at any rate, the excessive fury of the blast was itself moderating. The
thought of what errand I was on re-awoke within me, and I seemed to
breast the rough weather with increasing ease. With such a destination,
what mattered a little buffeting of wind or a sprinkle of cold water? I
recalled Flora's image, I took her in fancy to my arms, and my heart
throbbed. And the next moment I had recognised the inanity of that
fool's paradise. If I could spy her taper as she went to bed, I might
count myself lucky.

I had about two leagues before me of a road mostly uphill, and now deep
in mire. So soon as I was clear of the last street lamp, darkness
received me--a darkness only pointed by the lights of occasional rustic
farms, where the dogs howled with uplifted heads as I went by. The wind
continued to decline: it had been but a squall, not a tempest. The rain,
on the other hand, settled into a steady deluge, which had soon drenched
me thoroughly. I continued to tramp forward in the night, contending
with gloomy thoughts and accompanied by the dismal ululation of the
dogs. What ailed them that they should have been thus wakeful, and
perceived the small sound of my steps amid the general reverberation of
the rain, was more than I could fancy. I remembered tales with which I
had been entertained in childhood. I told myself some murderer was going
by, and the brutes perceived upon him the faint smell of blood; and the
next moment, with a physical shock, I had applied the words to my own
case!

Here was a dismal disposition for