Having done so, I need trouble you no further."
He bowed with chilling courtesy, and left the room. He had uttered no
word of consolation, no assurance of sympathy, to that pale widow of a
week; nothing could have been more marked than the omission of those
customary phrases, and Honoria keenly felt their absence.
The dead leaves strewed the avenue along which Sir Oswald Eversleigh
went to his last resting-place; the dead leaves fluttered slowly
downward from the giant oaks--the noble old beeches; there was not one
gleam of sunshine on the landscape, not one break in the leaden grey of
the sky. It seemed as if the funeral of departed summer was being
celebrated on this first dreary autumn day.
Lady Eversleigh occupied the second carriage in the stately procession.
She was alone. Captain Copplestone was confined to his room by the
gout. She went alone--tearless--in outward aspect calm as a statue; but
the face of the corpse hidden in the coffin could scarcely have been
whiter than hers.
As the procession passed out of the gates of Raynham, a tramp who stood
among the rest of the crowd, was strangely startled by the sight of
that beautiful face, so lovely even in its marble whiteness.
"Who is that woman sitting in yonder carriage?" he asked.
He was a rough, bare-footed vagabond, with a dark evil-looking
countenance, which he did well to keep shrouded by the broad brim of
his battered hat.
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