“I shall not want to go poking about,”
said sour little Mary; and just as suddenly as she
had begun to be rather sorry for Mr. Archibald Craven
she began to cease to be sorry and to think he was
unpleasant enough to deserve all that had happened
to him.
And she turned her face toward the streaming panes
of the window of the railway carriage and gazed out
at the gray rain-storm which looked as if it would
go on forever and ever. She watched it so long
and steadily that the grayness grew heavier and heavier
before her eyes and she fell asleep.
ACROSS THE MOOR
She slept a long time, and when she awakened Mrs.
Medlock had bought a lunchbasket at one of the stations
and they had some chicken and cold beef and bread
and butter and some hot tea. The rain seemed to
be streaming down more heavily than ever and everybody
in the station wore wet and glistening waterproofs.
The guard lighted the lamps in the carriage, and Mrs.
Medlock cheered up very much over her tea and chicken
and beef. She ate a great deal and afterward fell
asleep herself, and Mary sat and stared at her and
watched her fine bonnet slip on one side until she
herself fell asleep once more in the corner of the
carriage, lulled by the splashing of the rain against
the windows. It was quite dark when she awakened
again. The train had stopped at a station and
Mrs. Medlock was shaking her.
“You have had a sleep!” she said.
“It’s time to open your eyes! We’re
at Thwaite Station and we’ve got a long drive
before us.”
Mary stood up and tried to keep her eyes open while
Mrs. Medlock collected her parcels. The little
girl did not offer to help her, because in India native
servants always picked up or carried things and it
seemed quite proper that other people should wait on
one.
The station was a small one and nobody but themselves
seemed to be getting out of the train. The station-master
spoke to Mrs. Medlock in a rough, good-natured way,
pronouncing his words in a queer broad fashion which
Mary found out afterward was Yorkshire.
“I see tha’s got back,” he said.
“An’ tha’s browt th’ young
’un with thee.”
“Aye, that’s her,” answered Mrs.
Medlock, speaking with a Yorkshire accent herself
and jerking her head over her shoulder toward Mary.
“How’s thy Missus?”
“Well enow. Th’ carriage is waitin’
outside for thee.”
A brougham stood on the road before the little outside
platform. Mary saw that it was a smart carriage
and that it was a smart footman who helped her in.
His long waterproof coat and the waterproof covering
of his hat were shining and dripping with rain as
everything was, the burly station-master included.
When he shut the door, mounted the box with the coachman,
and they drove off, the little girl found herself
seated in a comfortably cushioned corner, but she
was not inclined to go to sleep again. She sat
and looked out of the window, curious to see something
of the road over which she was being driven to the
queer place Mrs. Medlock had spoken of. She was
not at all a timid child and she was not exactly frightened,
but she felt that there was no knowing what might happen
in a house with a hundred rooms nearly all shut up—a
house standing on the edge of a moor.
