The road-lamps
already glimmered; there would be no moon, but a soft dusky glow
lingered over half the sky, and gave promise of a fair night. Denzil
felt his boyhood revive as he got clear of the new houses, and began
to recognize gates, trees, banks, and stiles; he could not say
whether he enjoyed the sensation, but it served to combat certain
troublesome thoughts which had beset him since the morning. He was
experiencing reaction after the excitement of the last two days. A
change from the orderly domesticities of his sister's house had
become necessary to him, and he looked forward with satisfaction to
the evening he had planned.
At a turn of the road, which, as he well remembered, had been a
frequent limit of his nurse-guarded walk five-and-twenty years ago,
his eye fell upon a garden gate marked with the white inscription,
"Pear-tree Cottage." It brought him to a pause. This must be Mrs.
Wade's dwelling; the intellectual lady had quite slipped out of his
thoughts, and with amusement he stopped to examine the cottage as
well as dusk permitted. The front was overgrown with some creeper;
the low roof made an irregular line against the sky one window on
the ground-floor showed light through a red blind. Mrs. Wade, he had
learnt, enjoyed but a small income; the interior was probably very
modest. There she sat behind the red blind and meditated on the
servitude of her sex.
Pages:
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118