AFTER THE STORM.
Sir Michael was in his upon the weather. The did not off until next day, but with terrible over the village of Audley about an hour midnight.
Robert Audley took the and with the same with which he all the other of life. He on a sofa in the sitting-room, reading the five-days-old Chelmsford paper, and himself occasionally with a from a large of cold punch. But the had a different upon George Talboys. His friend was when he looked at the man's white as he sat opposite the open window to the thunder, and at the black sky, rent every now and then by of steel-blue lightning.
"George," said Robert, after him for some time, "are you of the lightning?"
"No," he answered, curtly.
"But, dear boy, some of the most men have been of it. It is to be called a fear: it is constitutional. I am sure you are of it."
"No, I am not."
"But, George, if you see yourself, white and haggard, with your great out at the sky as if they were upon a ghost. I tell you I know that you are frightened."
"And I tell you that I am not."
"George Talboys, you are not only of the lightning, but you are with for being afraid, and with me for telling you of your fear."
"Robert Audley, if you say another word to me, I shall you down," George, furiously; having said which, Mr. Talboys out of the room, the door after him with a that the house. Those clouds, which had in the earth as if with a of iron, out their in a as George left the room; but if the man was of the lightning, he was not of the rain; for he walked down-stairs to the door, and out into the wet high road. He walked up and down, up and down, in the for about twenty minutes, and then, re-entering the inn, up to his bedroom.
Robert Audley met him on the landing, with his about his white face, and his wet.
"Are you going to bed, George?"
"Yes."
"But you have no candle."
"I don't want one."
"But look at your clothes, man! Do you see the wet your coat-sleeves? What on earth you go out upon such a night?"
"I am tired, and want to go to bed—don't me."
"You'll take some brandy-and-water, George?"
Robert Audley in his friend's way as he spoke, to prevent his going to in the he was in; but George pushed him aside, and, past him, said, in the same voice Robert had noticed at the Court:
"Let me alone, Robert Audley, and keep clear of me if you can."
Robert George to his bedroom, but the man the door in his face, so there was nothing for it but to Mr. Talboys to himself, to his as best he might.
"He was at my noticing his terror of the lightning," Robert, as he retired to rest, to the thunder, which to shake him in his bed, and the playing the in his open dressing-case.
The rolled away from the village of Audley, and when Robert the next it was to see sunshine, and a of sky the white of his window.
It was one of those and that sometimes succeed a storm. The loud and cheerily, the yellow itself in the fields, and proudly after its with the tempest, which had done its best to the ears with wind and rain the night through. The vine-leaves Robert's window with a rustling, the rain-drops in diamond from every and tendril.
Robert Audley his friend waiting for him at the breakfast-table.
George was very pale, but perfectly tranquil—if anything, indeed, more than usual.
He Robert by the hand with something of that manner for which he had been the one of his life and him.
"Forgive me, Bob," he said, frankly, "for my of last night. You were in your assertion; the did me. It always had the same upon me in my youth."
"Poor old boy! Shall we go up by the express, or shall we stop here and with my uncle to-night?" asked Robert.
"To tell the truth, Bob, I would do neither. It's a morning. Suppose we about all day, take another turn with the and line, and go up to town by the train that here at 6.15 in the evening?"
Robert Audley would have to a more than this, than have taken the trouble to oppose his friend, so the was upon; and after they had their breakfast, and ordered a four o'clock dinner, George Talboys took the fishing-rod across his shoulders, and out of the house with his friend and companion.
But if the of Mr. Robert Audley had been by the of that the very of the Sun Inn, it had not been so with the more of his uncle's wife. Lady Audley herself of the lightning. She had her into a of the room, and with the her, she with her in the pillow, at every of the without. Sir Michael, had a fear, almost for this creature, it was his happy to protect and defend. My lady would not to till nearly three o'clock in the morning, when the last of had died away among the hills. Until that hour she in the dress in which she had traveled, together among the bedclothes, only looking up now and then with a to ask if the was over.
Toward four o'clock her husband, who the night in by her bedside, saw her off into a sleep, from which she did not for nearly five hours.
But she came into the breakfast-room, at half-past nine o'clock, a little Scotch melody, her with as a pink as the of her dress. Like the and the flowers, she to her and in the sunshine. She out onto the lawn, a last here and there, and a or two of geranium, and returning through the grass, long for very of heart, and looking as fresh and as the flowers in her hands. The her in his arms as she came in through the open window.
"My one," he said, "my darling, what to see you your own self again! Do you know, Lucy, that once last night, when you looked out through the dark-green bed-curtains, with your poor, white face, and the your eyes, I had almost a to my little wife in that terrified, agonized-looking creature, out about the storm. Thank God for the sun, which has the and smile! I to Heaven, Lucy, I shall again see you look as you did last night."
She on to him, and then was only tall to his white beard. She told him, laughing, that she had always been a silly, creature—frightened of dogs, of cattle, of a thunderstorm, of a sea. "Frightened of and but my dear, noble, husband," she said.
She had the in her dressing-room disarranged, and had into the of the passage. She Miss Alicia in a playful, laughing way, for her in two great men into my lady's rooms.
"And they had the to look at my picture, Alicia," she said, with indignation. "I the on the ground, and a great man's on the carpet. Look!"
"She up a thick as she spoke. It was George's, which he had looking at the picture.
"I shall go up to the Sun, and ask those boys to dinner," Sir Michael said, as he left the Court upon his walk around his farm.
Lady Audley from room to room in the September sunshine—now to the piano to out a ballad, or the page of an Italian bravura, or with through a waltz—now about a of hot-house flowers, doing with a pair of fairy-like, silver-mounted scissors—now into her dressing-room to talk to Phoebe Marks, and have her for the third or fourth time; for the were always into disorder, and gave no little trouble to Lady Audley's maid.
My dear lady seemed, on this particular September day, from very of spirit, and unable to long in one place, or herself with one thing.
While Lady Audley herself in her own fashion, the two men slowly along the of the until they a where the water was and still, and the long of the into the brook.
George Talboys took the fishing-rod, while Robert himself at full length on a railway rug, and his upon his nose as a screen from the sunshine, fast asleep.
Those were happy fish in the on the banks of which Mr. Talboys was seated. They might have themselves to their hearts' with at this gentleman's without in any manner their safety; for George only in the water, his in a loose, hand, and with a strange, far-away look in his eyes. As the church clock two he his rod, and, away along the bank, left Robert Audley to a which, according to that gentleman's habits, was by no means to last for two or three hours. About a of a mile on George a bridge, and into the which to Audley Court.
The had so much all the morning, that they had, perhaps, by this time tired; the lazy were asleep in the meadows; Sir Michael was still away on his morning's ramble; Miss Alicia had off an hour on her mare; the were all at dinner in the part of the house; and my lady had strolled, book in hand, into the lime-walk; so the old had a more peaceful than on that when George Talboys walked across the lawn to ring a at the sturdy, iron-bound door.
The who answered his told him that Sir Michael was out, and my lady walking in the lime-tree avenue.
He looked a little at this intelligence, and something about to see my lady, or going to look for my lady (the did not his words), away from the door without either card or message for the family.
It was full an hour and a after this when Lady Audley returned to the house, not from the lime-walk, but from the opposite direction, her open book in her hand, and as she came. Alicia had just from her mare, and in the low-arched doorway, with her great Newfoundland dog by her side.
The dog, which had liked my lady, his teeth with a growl.
"Send that animal away, Alicia," Lady Audley said, impatiently. "The that I am of him, and takes of my terror. And yet they call the and noble-hearted! Bah, Caesar! I you, and you me; and if you met me in the dark in some narrow passage you would at my and me, wouldn't you?"
My lady, safely her step-daughter, her yellow at the angry animal, and him maliciously.
"Do you know, Lady Audley, that Mr. Talboys, the widower, has been here for Sir Michael and you?"
Lucy Audley her eyebrows. "I they were to dinner," she said. "Surely we shall have of them then."
She had a of wild autumn flowers in the skirt of her dress. She had come through the at the of the Court, the hedge-row in her way. She ran up the to her own rooms. George's on her table. Lady Audley the violently, and it was answered by Phoebe Marks. "Take that away," she said, sharply. The girl the and a flowers and papers on the table into her apron.
"What have you been doing all this morning?" asked my lady. "Not your time, I hope?"
"No, my lady, I have been the dress. It is dark on this of the house, so I took it up to my own room, and at the window."
The girl was the room as she spoke, but she around and looked at Lady Audley as if waiting for orders.
Lucy looked up at the same moment, and the of the two met.
"Phoebe Marks," said my lady, herself into an easy-chair, and with the wild flowers in her lap, "you are a good, girl, and while I live and am prosperous, you shall want a friend or a twenty-pound note."
