Rather bluff to-night it be.

Will ye step in, Mr.
Fev'rel?
it's beginning' to spit,--going to be a wildish night, I reckon." Richard dismounted.

The farmer called one of his men to hold the mare, and ushered the young man in.

Once there, Richard's conjurations ceased.
There was a deadness about the rooms and passages that told of her absence.

The walls he touched--these were the vacant shells of her.
He had never been in the house since he knew her, and now what strange sweetness, and what pangs! Young Tom Blaize was in the parlour, squared over the table in open-mouthed examination of an ancient book of the fashions for a summer month which had elapsed during his mother's minority.