The Dead Secret, Wilkie Collins [best historical biographies .TXT] 📗

moor. There they stopped, and looked back again. The rest of their way lay down hill; and the spot on which they stood was the last point from which a view could be obtained of Porthgenna Tower.

“We have lost sight of the boy,” said Uncle Joseph, looking over the ground below them.

Sarah’s younger and sharper eyes bore witness to the truth of her uncle’s words⁠—the view over the moor was lonely now, in every direction, as far as she could see. Before going on again, she moved a little away from the old man, and looked at the tower of the ancient house, rising heavy and black in the dim light, with the dark sea background stretching behind it like a wall. “Never again!” she whispered to herself. “Never, never, never again!” Her eyes wandered away to the church, and to the cemetery inclosure by its side, barely distinguishable now in the shadows of the coming night. “Wait for me a little longer,” she said, looking toward the burial-ground with straining eyes, and pressing her hand on her bosom over the place where the book of Hymns lay hid. “My wanderings are nearly at an end; the day for my coming home again is not far off!”

The tears filled her eyes and shut out the view. She rejoined her uncle, and, taking his arm again, drew him rapidly a few steps along the downward path⁠—then checked herself, as if struck by a sudden suspicion, and walked back a few paces to the highest ridge of the ground. “I am not sure,” she said, replying to her companion’s look of surprise⁠—“I am not sure whether we have seen the last yet of that boy who was digging on the moor.”

As the words passed her lips, a figure stole out from behind one of the large fragments of granite rock which were scattered over the waste on all sides of them. It was once more the figure of the boy, and again he began to dig, without the slightest apparent reason, on the barren ground at his feet.

“Yes, yes, I see,” said Uncle Joseph, as his niece eagerly directed his attention to the suspicious figure. “It is the same boy, and he is digging still⁠—and, if you please, what of that?”

Sarah did not attempt to answer. “Let us get on,” she said, hurriedly. “Let us get on as fast as we can to the inn.”

They turned again, and took the downward path before them. In less than a minute they had lost sight of Porthgenna Tower, of the old church, and of the whole of the western view. Still, though there was now nothing but the blank darkening moorland to look back at, Sarah persisted in stopping at frequent intervals, as long as there was any light left, to glance behind her. She made no remark, she offered no excuse for thus delaying the journey back to the inn. It was only when they arrived within sight of the lights of the post-town that she ceased looking back, and that she spoke to her companion. The few words she addressed to him amounted to nothing more than a request that he would ask for a private sitting-room as soon as they reached their place of sojourn for the night.

They ordered beds at the inn, and were shown into the best parlor to wait for supper. The moment they were alone, Sarah drew a chair close to the old man’s side, and whispered these words in his ear⁠—

“Uncle! we have been followed every step of the way from Porthgenna Tower to this place.”

“So! so! And how do you know that?” inquired Uncle Joseph.

“Hush! Somebody may be listening at the door, somebody may be creeping under the window. You noticed that boy who was digging on the moor?⁠—”

“Bah! Why, Sarah! do you frighten yourself, do you try to frighten me about a boy?”

“Oh, not so loud! not so loud! They have laid a trap for us. Uncle! I suspected it when we first entered the doors of Porthgenna Tower; I am sure of it now. What did all that whispering mean between the housekeeper and the steward when we first got into the hall? I watched their faces, and I know they were talking about us. They were not half surprised enough at seeing us, not half surprised enough at hearing what we wanted. Don’t laugh at me, uncle! There is real danger: it is no fancy of mine. The keys⁠—come closer⁠—the keys of the north rooms have got new labels on them; the doors have all been numbered. Think of that! Think of the whispering when we came in, and the whispering afterward, in the housekeeper’s room, when you got up to go away. You noticed the sudden change in that man’s behavior after the housekeeper spoke to him⁠—you must have noticed it? They let us in too easily, and they let us out too easily. No, no! I am not deluding myself. There was some secret motive for letting us into the house, and some secret motive for letting us out again. That boy on the moor betrays it, if nothing else does. I saw him following us all the way here, as plainly as I see you. I am not frightened without reason, this time. As surely as we two are together in this room, there is a trap laid for us by the people at Porthgenna Tower!”

“A trap? What trap? And how? and why? and wherefore?” inquired Uncle Joseph, expressing bewilderment by waving both his hands rapidly to and fro close before his eyes.

“They want to make me speak, they want to follow me, they want to find out where I go, they want to ask me questions,” she answered, trembling violently. “Uncle! you remember what I told you of those crazed words I said to Mrs. Frankland⁠—I ought to have cut my tongue out rather than have spoken them! They have done dreadful mischief⁠—I am certain of it⁠—dreadful mischief already.