Shirley, Charlotte Brontë [free children's ebooks online .txt] 📗

She placed them on the table before her friend.

“Why would you rather sit up longer?” asked Miss Keeldar, taking up the firearms, examining them, and again laying them down.

“Because I have a strange, excited feeling in my heart.”

“So have I.”

“Is this state of sleeplessness and restlessness caused by something electrical in the air, I wonder?”

“No; the sky is clear, the stars numberless. It is a fine night.”

“But very still. I hear the water fret over its stony bed in Hollow’s Copse as distinctly as if it ran below the churchyard wall.”

“I am glad it is so still a night. A moaning wind or rushing rain would vex me to fever just now.”

“Why, Shirley?”

“Because it would baffle my efforts to listen.”

“Do you listen towards the Hollow?”

“Yes; it is the only quarter whence we can hear a sound just now.”

“The only one, Shirley.”

They both sat near the window, and both leaned their arms on the sill, and both inclined their heads towards the open lattice. They saw each other’s young faces by the starlight and that dim June twilight which does not wholly fade from the west till dawn begins to break in the east.

“Mr. Helstone thinks we have no idea which way he is gone,” murmured Miss Keeldar, “nor on what errand, nor with what expectations, nor how prepared. But I guess much; do not you?”

“I guess something.”

“All those gentlemen⁠—your cousin Moore included⁠—think that you and I are now asleep in our beds, unconscious.”

“Caring nothing about them⁠—hoping and fearing nothing for them,” added Caroline.

Both kept silent for full half an hour. The night was silent too; only the church clock measured its course by quarters. Some words were interchanged about the chill of the air. They wrapped their scarves closer round them, resumed their bonnets, which they had removed, and again watched.

Towards midnight the teasing, monotonous bark of the house-dog disturbed the quietude of their vigil. Caroline rose, and made her way noiselessly through the dark passages to the kitchen, intending to appease him with a piece of bread. She succeeded. On returning to the dining-room she found it all dark, Miss Keeldar having extinguished the candle. The outline of her shape was visible near the still open window, leaning out. Miss Helstone asked no questions; she stole to her side. The dog recommenced barking furiously. Suddenly he stopped, and seemed to listen. The occupants of the dining-room listened too, and not merely now to the flow of the mill-stream. There was a nearer, though a muffled, sound on the road below the churchyard⁠—a measured, beating, approaching sound⁠—a dull tramp of marching feet.

It drew near. Those who listened by degrees comprehended its extent. It was not the tread of two, nor of a dozen, nor of a score of men; it was the tread of hundreds. They could see nothing; the high shrubs of the garden formed a leafy screen between them and the road. To hear, however, was not enough, and this they felt as the troop trod forwards, and seemed actually passing the rectory. They felt it more when a human voice⁠—though that voice spoke but one word⁠—broke the hush of the night.

“Halt!”

A halt followed. The march was arrested. Then came a low conference, of which no word was distinguishable from the dining-room.

“We must hear this,” said Shirley.

She turned, took her pistols from the table, silently passed out through the middle window of the dining-room, which was, in fact, a glass door, stole down the walk to the garden wall, and stood listening under the lilacs. Caroline would not have quitted the house had she been alone, but where Shirley went she would go. She glanced at the weapon on the sideboard, but left it behind her, and presently stood at her friend’s side. They dared not look over the wall, for fear of being seen; they were obliged to crouch behind it. They heard these words⁠—

“It looks a rambling old building. Who lives in it besides the damned parson?”

“Only three women⁠—his niece and two servants.”

“Do you know where they sleep?”

“The lasses behind; the niece in a front room.”

“And Helstone?”

“Yonder is his chamber. He was burning a light, but I see none now.”

“Where would you get in?”

“If I were ordered to do his job⁠—and he desarves it⁠—I’d try yond’ long window; it opens to the dining-room. I could grope my way upstairs, and I know his chamber.”

“How would you manage about the women folk?”

“Let ’em alone except they shrieked, and then I’d soon quieten ’em. I could wish to find the old chap asleep. If he waked, he’d be dangerous.”

“Has he arms?”

“Firearms, allus⁠—and allus loadened.”

“Then you’re a fool to stop us here. A shot would give the alarm. Moore would be on us before we could turn round. We should miss our main object.”

“You might go on, I tell you. I’d engage Helstone alone.”

A pause. One of the party dropped some weapon, which rang on the stone causeway. At this sound the rectory dog barked again furiously⁠—fiercely.

“That spoils all!” said the voice. “He’ll awake. A noise like that might rouse the dead. You did not say there was a dog. Damn you! Forward!”

Forward they went⁠—tramp, tramp⁠—with mustering, manifold, slow-filing tread. They were gone.

Shirley stood erect, looked over the wall, along the road.

“Not a soul remains,” she said.

She stood and mused. “Thank God!” was the next observation.

Caroline repeated the ejaculation⁠—not in so steady a tone. She was trembling much. Her heart was beating fast and thick; her face was cold, her forehead damp.

“Thank God for us!” she reiterated. “But what will happen elsewhere? They have passed us by that they may make sure of others.”

“They have done well,” returned Shirley, with composure. “The others will defend themselves. They can do it. They are prepared for them. With us it is otherwise. My finger was on the trigger of this pistol. I was quite ready to give that man, if he had entered, such a greeting as he little calculated on; but behind him followed three hundred. I had