am away
the time until, somewhile after the final departure of her parents, she
was free to return. When she did so she found the old woman sitting
where she had left her, to all seeming quite contented. The day had died
a sudden death intestate, and the flickering firelight meant to have its
say unmolested, till candletime. The intrusion of artificial light was
intercepted by Gwen, who liked to sit and talk to Mrs. Picture in the
twilight, thank you, Mrs. Masham! Take it away!

Where had the old mind wandered in that two hours' interval? Had the
actual meeting with her sister--utterly incredible even had she known
its claims to belief--taken any hold on it that bore comparison with
that of Farmer Jones's Bull, for instance, or the visit of a real live
Earl? Certainly not the former, while as for the latter it was at best a
half-way grip between the two; perhaps farther, if anything, from the
supreme Bull, the great enthralling interest that was to be vested in
her letter to Dave, to be written at the next favourable climax of
strength, nourished by repose. Some time in the morning--to-day she was
far too tired to think of it.

How she dwelt upon that appalling quadruped, and his savage breast--have
bulls breasts?--soothed by the charms of music! How she phrased the
various best ways of describing the mountain he was pleased to call his
neck, with its half-hundredweight of dewlap; the merciless strength of
his horns; the blast of steam from his nostrils into the chill of the
October day; the deep-seated objection to everybody in his lurid eyes,
attesting the unclubableness of his disposition! How she hesitated
between this way and that of expressing to the full his murderousness
and the beautiful pliancy of his soul, if got at the right way; showing,
as the pseudo-Browning has it, that "we never should think good
impossible"!

One thing she made up her mind to. She would not tell that dear boy,
that this bull--which was in a sense _his_ bull, or Sapps Court's,
according as you look at it--had ever had to succumb on a fair field of
battle. For Gwen had told her, as they rode home, and she had roused
herself to hear it, how one summer morning, so early that even rangers
were still abed and asleep, they were waked by terrific bellowings from
a distant glade in the parklands, and, sallying out to find the cause,
were only just in time to save the valued life of this same bull--even
Jones's. For he had broken down a gate