de Kilian, were
following him out into the tempest. We saw their lanterns flicker for an
instant, and then they were swallowed up in the darkness. The fury of
the storm increased every moment. The flashes of lightning were but a
few seconds apart, and the roll of thunder was incessant. Every few
moments, above this continued roar, would come an appalling crash which
sounded just above our heads. The children were screaming with fear, the
servants had come into the hall and seemed in a helpless sort of panic.
Sophie was very pale and Mary Leighton clung hysterically to her.
Charlotte Benson was the only one who seemed to be self-possessed enough
to have done anything, if there had been anything to do. But there was
not. All we could do was to try to behave ourselves with fortitude in
view of the personal danger, and with composure in view of that of
others. Presently there came a lull in the tempest, and we began to
breathe freer; some one went to the door and opened it. A gust of cold
wind swept through the hall and put out the lamp, at which the children
and Mary Leighton renewed their cries of fright.

The respite in the tempest was but temporary; before the lamp was relit
and order restored, the storm had burst again upon us. This was, if
anything, fiercer, but shorter lived. After fifteen or twenty minutes'
rage, it subsided almost utterly, and we could hear it taking itself off
across the heavens. I suppose the whole storm, from its beginning to its
end, had not occupied more than three quarters of an hour, but it had
seemed much longer.

We were very glad to open the door and let the cool, damp air into the
hall. The children were taken up-stairs, consoled with the promise that
word should be sent to them when their uncles should return. The
servants went feebly off to their domain; one was sent to sweep the
piazza, for the rain had beaten in such torrents upon it that it was
impossible to walk there, till it should be brushed away. Wrapped in
their shawls, Henrietta and Charlotte Benson walked up and down the
space that the servant swept, and watched and listened for a long
half-hour. I took a cloak from the rack and, leaning against the
door-post, stood and listened silently.

From the direction of the river there was nothing to be heard. There was
still distant thunder, but that was the only sound, that and the
dripping of the rain off the leaves of the drenched trees. The wind was
almost silent, and in the