"
"Indeed, that is strange. But it doesn't mean anything. She's grateful
enough to you at heart, depend upon it she is, only she did not like to
say so. Dear me, how it blows; we shall have a night of it, a regular
gale, I declare. So you are going away to-morrow morning. Well, the
best of friends must part. I hope that you will often come and see us.
Good-bye."
Once more a sense of the irony of the position overcame Geoffrey, and he
smiled grimly as he lit his candle and went to bed. At the back of the
house was a long passage, which terminated at one end in the room where
he slept, and at the other in that occupied by Elizabeth and Beatrice.
This passage was lit by two windows, and built out of it were two more
rooms--that of Mr. Granger, and another which had been Effie's. The
windows of the passage, like most of the others in the Vicarage, were
innocent of shutters, and Geoffrey stood for a moment at one of them,
watching the lightning illumine the broad breast of the mountain behind.
Then looking towards the door of Beatrice's room, he gazed at it with
the peculiar reverence that sometimes afflicts people who are very much
in love, and, with a sigh, turned and sought his own.
Pages:
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373