CHAPTER IV.


The wind that in the hurly-burly out of doors had been a cheerful if
boisterous enemy, seemed suddenly transformed into a wailing spirit when
Susannah was making her way up the stairs of the darkening wooden house.
Its master and mistress had not yet returned from burying the dead. The
girl made her way up to Ephraim's room. The books were left open upon
the table; no one was there.

It was a new thing that Ephraim should breast a storm.

Susannah trudged downstairs again and dried her bedraggled skirts at the
fire--an empty house, a dreary wailing wind, and gathering twilight for
her sole companions.

At length a step was heard. Ephraim came in bearing Susannah's rain
cloak and goloshes. He was wet, pale, and breathless, but he would not
betray his weakness and excitement by a word.

"You were looking for me, Ephraim, and some one told you that I had come
home. Did you hear who brought me? O Ephraim! I have been out walking
with the false prophet, and then with one of his disciples." Susannah,
sitting by the fire, looked at him trying to smile through his gloom.

She began again, then stopped; how to impart the full flavour of that
which had befallen her she did not know. It seemed to her that the
difficulty lay in Ephraim's silence. She was not aware that she had not
even a distinct thought for a certain interest in her late companion
which she most wanted to put into words. "Ephraim, it's all very well