somebody was raising the white blind of one of the windows. Such was the home of Lucy. As the train passed, I noticed that not far from the gate of Clousedale Hall there was a small group of cottages, with a little public house at their nearest corner. The train ran so close that I could read the sign. It was the “Clousedale Arms.”
We drew up at the station, and I looked around to see if there was any one to meet me. It was still as early as half past eight, and the morning was chill, but spite of reason I had half cherished the hope that Lucy herself would have driven down. At least I thought Mrs. Hill might be there. I saw neither. There was no carriage, no trap, no recognizable servant of any kind. When the miners had trooped away the platform would have been empty but for myself and the servants of the railway. I hailed the porter.
“Anybody here who can carry my bag to Clousedale Hall?” I asked.
“Then mebbe you're the gentleman that's expected,” he said, and diving into his jacket pocket, he produced a letter.
It was addressed “Robert Harcourt, Esq.,” and was not in Lucy's handwriting. The letter was from Mrs. Hill, and was dated 9 p.m., Sunday, Dec. 23.
Dear Sir:
I am sorry to tell you that Lucy has suddenly become ill, and that the doctor thinks it necessary that she should have absolute quiet and rest during the next few days. There is no danger of any kind, and therefore I trust you will not feel anxiety, still less alarm. But, under the circumstances, I am reluctantly compelled to ask you not to come to Clousedale Hall at present. I have taken the liberty of engaging rooms for you at the Wheatsheaf in the village, where I trust you will be comfortable until such time as I can properly and safely give my dear one the great happiness of asking you to remove your quarters to this house. With every apology, disappointment, and regret, I am, dear Mr. Harcourt,
Yours very sincerely,
Martha Hill.
“Take my bag to the Wheatsheaf, porter,” I said.
He took it up and trudged off, and I followed him. I was pained, dazed, and bewildered.
II.
Breakfast was ready for me at the inn, but I could not touch it until I had written to Lucy. I told her with what concern I heard of her illness, how I hoped for her speedy recovery, how grievous was my disappointment at not seeing her immediately on my arrival in her country, with much beside of too intimate a nature to be repeated here. After this letter had been despatched by hand, I sat down to breakfast, and the landlady herself waited upon me as I ate. She was a worthy Cumberland woman in middle life, very staid and serious, but somewhat more talkative than the generality of her race. Her name was Tyson; her husband was something of a sportsman; they were living on the Clousedale property.
Mrs. Tyson had much to say about Lucy, whom she had known since earliest childhood, of her goodness to the poor, her personal sweetness to everybody, her generosity (exhibited in many ways), and generally of the qualities of mind and heart which had endeared her beyond all others to the people of the district wherein she had been born and reared. It did not surprise me that, as seen in the eyes of those who had known her longest and most intimately, my darling proved to be as good as she was beautiful. I gathered that she was interested in various local institutions for the social welfare of the people—in workmen's clubs, an evening ragged school, and a branch of the Rechabite order, which she had helped to establish. It appeared that, at her own cost—the parish church lying two miles away in the dale—she had even gone so far as to build and endow a little chapel of ease for the use of the community that had grown up on the moor top, around the pits which her family had worked for generations. The landlady was warm in her relation of these good offices; and when I inquired about Lucy's health, if it had ever hitherto given cause for anxiety, she answered no, that only twice before, as far back as they could remember, had she been at all unwell, and both attacks had been within the past six months.
“Nothing serious, surely?” I said.
“Nay, not that I know of,” said the landlady. “But the poor young lady seemed that glad to be better that she nivver knew how to be good enough to anybody the moment she was gotten round. And a cruel pity it was to see her white face going from house to house with her basket and her purse. It was then that she got her new Scotch parson to start the Rechabites. The sweet little body went over the moor herself, persuading the miners to take the pledge—and a good thing for some of them, too, for all it's the wife of a publican that says so.”
My night long journey had wearied me,
