The Argosy — page 36: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Mrs. Raven's Temptation. 23 Despite his unwillingness, he had to enter; and that was how it ended—in another round of hand-shakings and inquiries and regrets. Evelyn did not leave her seat at the dining-table, and Louisa came back and resumed hers before the door had closed behind Marco. Everybody retired early, because everybody was tired. No dis- turbance occurred that night. But in that small, quiet, comfortable household there were two—one of the young people and one of the seniors—who never closed their eyes. One lay with her face buried in her pillow. The other drew her curtains aside, and sat down beside her unscreened window—and watched. What did Mrs. Raven watch for! What did she see? Why did she find herself an hour afterwards returning to consciousness seated in her chair by the window, her candle burned down, and the moon, which had been shining so brightly, lost behind thick clouds? If she had told Philip what she had seen, he might have answered her that dreams are strange combinations of the facts and fancies of past hours. . But when we are not sure of ourselves whether we are waking or sleeping; when we feel that if our fancies are fancies they are worse than facts, because they leave no solid ground whereon to set our own soul, then we begin to keep our own counsel. But nobody was disturbed that night by any sound in Mr. Connell’s house. PuaaArteR. XxXVI. ADMITTED THE next morning rose dull and grey, with a fine drizzle of rain, one of those genuinely English days which come at the most un- expected seasons, and serve, at least, as material for conversation. Mrs. Raven did not appear at breakfast. Word came down that she was not well. And when Mrs. Connell went to see her she was struck with her nervous and wrung appearance. She thought that these manifest traces of suffering must be latent: this passing indisposition surely could not produce them! ‘The kind woman’s heart warmed to her. She was her brother’s widow, after all. Mrs. Connell was startled to find that Mrs. Raven seemed to have set her heart on going home, saying that she found she was in no condition to be anybody’s guest, and that she feared that change, from which she had hoped so much, was only making her worse. “My dear—-sister,” Mrs. Connell actually said, in her compassion, “You have not given it a fair trial yet. I believe that fright the other night has upset you. You must not imagine such a thing is likely to occur again. I can assure you such incidents are as rare here as they COMMICDAOOKS.EO