On this particular morning of the opening of the hunting season, Walden sat by the fire reading,--or trying to read. He was conscious of a great depression,--a 'fit of the blues,' which he attributed partly to the damp, lowering weather. Idly he turned over the leaves of a first edition of Tennyson's poems,--pausing here and there to glance at a favourite lyric or con over a well-remembered verse, when the echo of a silvery horn blown clear on the wintry silence startled him out of his semi-abstraction. Rising, he went instinctively to the window, though from that he could see nothing but his own garden, looking blank enough in its flowerless condition, the only bright speck in it being a robin sitting on a twig hard by, that ruffled its red breast prettily and blinked its trustful eye at him with a friendly air of sympathy and recognition. He listened attentively for a moment and heard the approaching trot and gallop of horses,--then suddenly recalling the fact that the hounds were to meet that day at Ittlethwaite Park, he took his hat and went out to see if any of the hunters were passing by.
A wavering mass of colour gleamed at the farther end of the village as he looked down the winding road;--scarlet coats, white vests and buckskin breeches showed bravely against the satiny brown and greys of a fine group of gaily prancing steeds that came following after the huntsmen, the hounds and the whippers-in, and a cheery murmur of pleasant voices, broken with an occasional musical ring of laughter, dispersed for a time the heaviness of the rainy air. Something unusually pleasant seemed to animate the faces of all who composed the hunting train as they came into view,--Miss Arabella Ittlethwaite, for example, portly of bulk though she was, sat in her saddle with an almost mirthful lightness, her good-natured fat face all smiles,--while her brother Bruce, laughing heartily over something which had evidently tickled his fancy, looked more like thirty than sixty, so admirably did his 'pink' become him, and so excellently well did he ride. Walden saluted them as they passed, and they gave him a pleasant 'good-day.' But,--what was that sudden flash of deep purple, which the fitful sun, peering sulkily through grey clouds, struck upon quickly with a slanting half-smile of radiance? What--and who was the woman riding lightly, with uplifted head like a queen, in the midst of the company, surrounded by all the younger men of the neighbourhood who, keeping their horses close on either side of her, appeared to be trying to outrival each other in eager attentions, in questions and answers, in greetings and hat- liftings, and general exchange of courtesies? Walden rubbed his eyes, and gazed and gazed,-anon his heart gave a wild leap, and he felt himself growing deadly pale. Had the portrait of 'Mary Elia Adelgisa de Vaignecourt' in Abbot's Manor come visibly to life?--or was it, could it be indeed,--Maryllia?