was highly connected--were thankful that this unlucky business had not
occurred in the time of the late master, who was both old and foolish,
and would have made it the talk of all England, instead of hushing it
up, with the prudent decision of Dr. Grey, so that now it was scarcely
spoken of beyond the college walls.

Solemn, quiet, and beautiful, as if they had never known a scandal or a
tragedy, slept those old walls in the moonlight, which streamed also in
long bars from window to window, across the ghostly gallery before
mentioned. Ghostly enough in all conscience; and yet two little figures
went trotting fearlessly down it, as they did every night at eight o'clock,
between the two ancient apartments now converted into dining-room
and nursery. The master's children were too familiar with these grim,
shadowy corners to feel the slightest dread besides, they were not
imaginative children. To Arthur, an "ally taw," that is, a real alabaster
marble, such as he now fumbled in his pocket, was an object of more
importance than all the defunct bishops, archbishops, kings, queens,
and benefactors of every sort, whose grim portraits stared at him by day
and night. And Letitia was far more anxious that the candle she carried
should not drop any of its grease upon her best silk frock, than alarmed
at the grotesque shadows it cast, making every portrait seem to follow
her with his eyes, as old portraits always do. Neither child was very
interesting. Letitia, with her angular figure and thin light hair, looked
not unlike a diminished spectral reflection of the foundress herself--that
pale, prim, pre-Raphaelitish dame who was represented all over the
college, in all sizes and varieties of the limner's art. Arthur, who hung
a little behind his sister, was different from her, being stout and square;
but he, too, was not an attractive child, and there was a dormant
sullenness in his under lip which showed he could be a very naughty
one if he chose.