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Le Fanu, Joseph Sheridan, 1814-1873

"Uncle Silas A Tale of Bartram-Haugh"


They're all down yonder; git ye back, Miss, to the hoose--be the side-door;
mind ye, don't go round the corner; and I'll jest sit awhile among the
bushes, and wait a good time for a start. And good-bye, Miss; and don't ye
show like as if there was aught out o' common on your mind. Hish!'
There was a distant hallooing.
'That be fayther!' she whispered, with a very blank countenance, and
listened with her sunburnt hand to her ear.
'Tisn't me, only Davy he'll be callin',' she said, with a great sigh, and a
joyless smile. 'Now git ye away i' God's name.'
So running lightly along the path, under cover of this thick wood, I
recalled Mary Quince, and together we hastened back again to the house, and
entered, as directed, by the side-door, which did not expose us to be
seen from the Windmill Wood, and, like two criminals, we stole up by the
backstairs, and so through the side-gallery to my room; and there sat down
to collect my wits, and try to estimate the exact effect of what had just
occurred.
Madame had not returned. That was well; she always visited my room first,
and everything was precisely as I had left it--a certain sign that her
prying eyes and busy fingers had not been at work during my absence.


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