‘So late?  After midnight?’

’Why not?  She cannot stay in this small house—­so near the dead.  There is a moon, and there is no snow falling, and we are within seven miles of Fellside.’

The doctor had nothing further to say against the arrangement, although such a drive seemed to him a somewhat wild and reckless proceeding.  Mr. Steadman’s grave, self-possessed manner answered all doubts.  Mr. Evans filled in the certificate for the undertaker, drank a glass of hot brandy and water, and remounted his nag, in nowise relishing his midnight ride, but consoling himself with the reflection that he would be handsomely paid for his trouble.

An hour later Lady Maulevrier’s travelling carriage stood ready in the stable yard, in the deep shadow of wall and gables.  It was at Steadman’s order that the carriage waited for her ladyship at an obscure side door, rather than in front of the inn.  An east wind was blowing keenly along the mountain road, and the careful Steadman was anxious his mistress should not be exposed to that chilly blast.

There was some delay, and the four horses jingled their bits impatiently, and then the door of the inn opened, a feeble light gleamed in the narrow passage within, Steadman stood ready to assist her ladyship, there was a bustle, a confusion of dark figures on the threshold, a huddled mass of cloaks and fur wraps was lifted into the carriage, the door was clapped to, the horses went clattering out of the yard, turned sharply into the snowy road, and started at a swinging pace towards the dark sullen bulk of Loughrigg Fell.

The moon was shining upon Elterwater in the valley yonder—­the mountain ridges, the deep gorges below those sullen heights, looked back where the shadow of night enfolded them, but all along the snow-white road the silver light shone full and clear, and the mountain way looked like a path through fairyland.

CHAPTER V.

Forty years after.

‘What a horrid day!’ said Lady Mary, throwing down her book with a yawn, and looking out of the deep bay window into a world of mountain and lake which was clouded over by a dense veil of rain and dull grey mist; such rain as one sees only in a lake district, a curtain of gloom which shuts off sky and distance, and narrows the world to one solitary dwelling, suspended amidst cloud and water, like another ark in a new deluge.

Rain—­such rain as makes out-of-door exercise impossible—­was always an affliction to Lady Mary Haselden.  Her delight was in open air and sunshine—­fishing in the lake and rivers—­sitting in some sheltered hollow of the hills more fitting for an eagle’s nest than for the occupation of a young lady, trying to paint those ever-varying, unpaintable mountain peaks, which change their hues with every change of the sky—­swimming, riding, roving far and wide over hill and heather—­pleasures all more or less masculine in their nature, and which were a subject of regret with Lady Maulevrier.