This eBook was produced by David Widger
It was a serene noonday in that melancholy interlude of the seasons whenautumn has really ceased—winter not yet visibly begun. The same hiredvehicle which had borne Lionel to Fawley more than five years ago,stopped at the gate of the wild umbrageous grass-land that surroundedthe antique Manor-house. It had been engaged, from the nearest railway-station on the London road, by a lady, with a female companion who seemedher servant. The driver dismounted, opened the door of the vehicle, andthe lady bidding him wait there till her return, and saying a few wordsto her companion, descended, and, drawing her cloak round her, walked onalone towards the Manor-house. At first her step was firm, and her pacequick. She was still under the excitement of the resolve in which thejourney from her home had been suddenly conceived and promptlyaccomplished. But as the path wound on through the stillness ofvenerable groves, her courage began to fail her. Her feet loitered, hereyes wandered round vaguely, timidly. The scene was not new to her. Asshe gazed, rushingly gathered over her sorrowful shrinking mind memoriesof sportive happy summer days, spent in childhood amidst those turfs andshades-memories, more agitating, of the last visit (childhood thenripened into blooming youth) to the ancient dwelling which, yet concealedfrom view by the swells of the undulating ground and the yellow boughs ofthe giant trees, betrayed its site by the smoke rising thin and dimagainst the limpid atmosphere. She bent down her head, closing her eyesas if to shut out less the face of the landscape than the images thatrose ghost-like up to people it, and sighed heavily, heavily. Now, hardby, roused from its bed amongst the fern, the doe that Darrell had tainedinto companionship had watched with curiosity this strange intruder onits solitary range. But at the sound of that heavy sigh, the creature,emboldened, left its halting-place, and stole close to the saddenedwoman, touching her very dress. Doubtless, as Darrell's companion in hismost musing hours, the doe was familiarised to the sound of sighs, andassociated the sound with its gentlest notions of humanity.
The lady, starting, raised her drooping lids, and met those soft darkeyes, dark and soft as her own. Round the animal's neck there was asimple collar, with a silver plate, fresh and new, evidently placed thererecently; and as the creature thrust forward its head, as if for thecaress of a wonted hand, the lady read the inscription. The words werein Italian, and may be construed thus: "Female, yet not faithless;fostered, yet not ungrateful." As she read, her heart so swelled, andher resolve so deserted her, that she turned as if she had received asentence of dismissal, and went back some hasty paces. The doe followedher till she paused again, and then it went slowly down a narrow path tothe left, which led to the banks of the little lake.
The lady had now recovered herself. "It is a duty, and it must be done,"she muttered, and letting clown the veil she had raised on entering thedemesne, she hurried on, not retracing her steps in the same path, buttaking that into which the doe had stricken, perhaps in the confusedmistake of a mind absorbed and absent-perhaps in revived recollection ofthe localities, for the way thus to the house was shorter than by theweed-grown carriage-road. The lake came in view, serene and glassy;half-leafless woodlands reflected far upon its quiet waters; the doehalted, lifted its head, and sniffed the air, and, somewhat quickeningits pace, vanished