A little grove of
black poplars under the gable-window, kept swaying their expostulations,
and moaning their entreaties. The great rushing blasts of the wind
through their rooted resistance, made the music of the band that
accompanied the march of the unknown. I sat and listened, with the vague
conviction that something was being done somewhere. It could not be that
only the wind and the trees and the rain were in all that wailing and
marching! The Powers of life and death must somewhere be at work! Then
rose before me the face of my uncle, as he walked from the room, haloed
in a sorrowful stillness. If only I could be with him! If only I knew
where to seek him! Wishing, wishing, I sat and listened to the rain and
the wind.
Suddenly I found myself on my feet, making for the door. I would not have
ventured alone upon the moor in such a night, but I should have Zoe with
me, who knew all the ways of it--had doubtless been used to bogs in her
own country, and her mother before her! Like a small elephant, she would
put out her little foot, and tap, and sound, to see if the surface would
bear her--if the questionable spot was what it looked to her mistress, or
what she herself doubted it. When she had once made up her mind in the
negative, no foolish attempt of mine could overpersuade her--could make
her trust our weight on it a hair's-breadth.
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