'What's the matter, for heaven's sake, Viviette?' said Louis.
'My husband!' she involuntarily exclaimed.
'What nonsense!' 'O yes, it is nonsense,' she added, with an effort. 'It was nothing.' 'But what was the cause of your cry?' She had by this time recovered her reason and judgment. 'O, it was a
trick of the imagination,' she said, with a faint laugh. 'I live so much
alone that I get superstitious--and--I thought for the moment I saw an
apparition.' 'Of your late husband?' 'Yes. But it was nothing; it was the outline of the--tall clock and the chair behind. Would you mind going down, and leaving me to go into my
room for a moment?' She entered the bedroom, and her brother went downstairs. Swithin
thought it best to leave well alone, and going noiselessly out of the
house plodded through the rain homeward. It was plain that agitations of
one sort and another had so weakened Viviette's nerves as to lay her open
to every impression. That the clothes he had borrowed were some cast-off
garments of the late Sir Blount had occurred to St. Cleeve in taking
them; but in the moment of returning to her side he had forgotten this,
and the shape they gave to his figure had obviously been a reminder of
too sudden a sort for her. Musing thus he walked along as if he were
still, as before, the lonely student, dissociated from all mankind, and
with no shadow of right or interest in Welland House or its mistress.
The great-coat and cap were unpleasant companions; but Swithin having
been reared, or having reared himself, in the scientific school of
thought, would not give way to his sense of their weirdness. To do so
would have been treason to his own beliefs and aims.
When nearly home, at a point where his track converged on another path,
there approached him from the latter a group of indistinct forms. The
tones of their speech revealed them to be Hezzy Biles, Nat Chapman, Fry,
and other labourers. Swithin was about to say a word to them, till
recollecting his disguise he deemed it advisable to hold his tongue, lest
his attire should tell a too dangerous tale as to where he had come from.
By degrees they drew closer, their walk being in the same direction.
'Good-night, strainger,' said Nat.
The stranger did not reply.
All of them paced on abreast of him, and he could perceive in the gloom
that their faces were turned inquiringly upon his form. Then a whisper
passed from one to another of them; then Chapman, who was the boldest,
dropped immediately behind his heels, and followed there for some
distance, taking close observations of his outline, after which the men
grouped again and whispered. Thinking it best to let them pass on
Swithin slackened his pace, and they went ahead of him, apparently
without much reluctance.