r mind, the sight
shocked their sense of the fitness of things, and they slipped off
without a word. Indeed, a butcher's boy, with a turn for expressive
language, remarked in indignation to another of his craft so soon as
they had recovered their spirits.

"Call that a weddin', Bill; why, it's more like a--funeral with the
plumes off; and as for the gal, though she's a 'clipper,' her face was
as pale as a 'long 'un's.'"

Angela never quite knew how she got back to the Abbey House. She only
remembered that she was by herself in the fly, her father preferring
to travel on the box alone with the coachman. Nor could she ever quite
remember how she got through the remainder of that day. She was quite
mazed. But at length it passed, and the night came, and she was
thankful for the night.

About nine o'clock she went up to her bedroom at the top of the house.
It had served as a nursery for many generations of Caresfoots; indeed,
during the last three centuries, hundreds of little feet had pattered
over the old worm-eaten boards. But the little feet had long since
gone to dust, and the only signs of children's play and merriment left
about the place were the numberless scratches, nicks, and letters cut
in the old panelling, and even on the beams which supported the low
ceiling.

It was a lonesome room for a young girl, or, indeed, for anybody whose
nerves were not of the strongest. Nobody slept upon that floor or in
the rooms beneath it, Philip occupying a little closet which joined
his study on the ground floor. All the other rooms were closed, and
tenanted only by rats that made unearthly noises in their emptiness.
As for Jakes and his wife, the only servants on the place, they
occupied a room over the washhouse, which was separate from the main
building. Angela was therefore practically alone in a great house, and
might have been murdered a dozen times over without the fact being
discovered for hours. This did not, however, trouble her much, simply
because she paid no heed to the noises in the house, and was
singularly free from fear of any kind.

On reaching her room, she sat down and began to think of Arthur, and,
as she thought, her mind grew clearer and more at peace. Indeed, it
seemed to her that her dead lover was near, and as though she could
distinguish pulsations of thought which came from him, impinging on
her system, and bringing his presence with them. It is a common
sensation, and occurs to many people of