The lattice-windows were all thrown open, and we sat just within the doorway watching the storm.
It was grand to see how the wind awoke, and bent the trees, and drove the rain before it like a cloud of smoke; and to hear the solemn thunder and to see the lightning; and while thinking with awe of the tremendous powers by which our little lives are encompassed, to consider how beneficent they are and how upon the smallest flower and leaf there was already a freshness poured from all this seeming rage which seemed to make creation new again.
"Is it not dangerous to sit in so exposed a place ?" "Oh, no, Esther dear!" said Ada quietly.
Ada said it to me, but I had not spoken.
The beating of my heart came back again.

I had never heard the voice, as I had never seen the face, but it affected me in the same strange way.

Again, in a moment, there arose before my mind innumerable pictures of myself.
Lady Dedlock had taken shelter in the lodge before our arrival there and had come out of the gloom within.

She stood behind my chair with her hand upon it.

I saw her with her hand close to my shoulder when I turned my head.
"I have frightened you ?" she said.
No.