56. CHAPTER LVI.
THROUGH THE SNOW.
It was nearly sunset, and the snow was falling steadily when
Puccoon re-entered his cabin. The Lady of the Snow met him at
the door, and with alarm in her face asked where Fanny was.
Puccoon described the accident in a few words, and how the girl
had been taken to Blandfield—his companion listening with pale
cheeks, eyes full of anxiety, and broken exclamations. Her agitation
was such that she could not remain a moment still. She rose
and went to and fro—looking out of the window with an expression
of longing and impatience. Never were excitement and
uneasiness more eloquently indicated by a human being.
She asked Puccoon a thousand questions. Fanny's arm was
broken? Was it badly broken? Had she fainted? Had she
suffered from the movement of the coach? Had a doctor come
promptly? Had the poor, poor child cried when they set her
arm? The pale face flushed at the picture thus drawn in imagination,
and the lady sobbed, wiping her eyes and trembling.
Puccoon had taken his seat in front of the fire, and leaning his
elbows on his knees, held his head in his two hands. From time
to time he coughed painfully. He was evidently in low spirits,
and having unburdened himself about Fanny, fell into a dull,
apathetic reverie. The lady of the Snow still went and came—
glanced through the window—and seemed unable to rest.
All at once she stopped, looking at Puccoon. He plainly did not
observe her movements, and had probably forgotten her presence.
She looked, then, through the window. The snow continued to
fall.
“I must go to her!” she murmured. “But he is ill, and ought
not to expose himself. He will not let me go alone—I must steal
away. I shall know the road—I can follow his steps.”
She took her old black hood and cloak, wrapped them around
her, silently opened the door, and passing through it, closed it
behind her. Through the small windows she could see Puccoon
still seated before the fire, with his elbows on his knees and his
hands supporting his forehead—dozing, it seemed.
“He will not miss me at once,” she murmured; “he will think
that I have gone to rest. To-morrow he will come to see Fanny.”
She hurried along the hollow, following Puccoon's footsteps,
which were still plainly visible, although the falling snow was
doing its best to obliterate them. They led up the hollow, around
a hill covered with pines, across a small stream, and into a county
road, skirted with ditches and mounds crowned with cedars. Along
this road she eagerly hastened, following the nearly obliterated
steps.
She did not pay any attention to the snow, which a light wind
now began to blow in her face. A dim recollection of another
snow-storm came to her—that storm in which she had tottered on
faintly, and ever grown feebler and feebler, and fallen at last, with
the steady, silent, pitiless snow-fall weaving her shroud.
She would not fall now! She had been hopeless then—now a
new influence had dawned upon her life—new strength had entered
her frame—love for Fanny bore her up, and drove her onward,
unfaltering, stopping for nothing. She thought only that the child
was lying weak and pale at Blandfield, and she would reach her—
she would not die upon the way!—she would hold her in her arms
again, and kiss her, and fondle her, and say, “I am by you Fanny!
I will not leave you!”
The thought “I will see her soon!” made the wan cheek glow,
and the Lady of the Snow hastened on through the night. She
never knew how she found her way, all those long and weary miles,
for the footprints of Puccoon were soon covered by the wind blowing
the snow into them. She pressed on, keeping the main road—
following her instinct.
Fields, roads, hollows, hills were passed. With head bent down,
and wrapped in her cloak, the night-traveller hurried on—a solitary
black figure moving on the bleak white highway.
It must have been the instinct of the heart which made her look
up at last. She saw across the fields, on her left, a glimmering
light. A road skirted with a low fence led toward the light. She
turned into this road, went through a tall gate, and hastened up an
avenue, at the end of which, on a gentle acclivity, stood a friendly-looking
old mansion in the midst of oaks, and ghostly poplars,
rising like spectres in the storm.
She hurried on, reached the house, went rapidly up the steps,
and—panting, tottering, worn-out, now—knocked at the door.
Light steps came quickly, and Evelyn opened the door. A figure
was leaning against it, trembling and faint.
Either from weakness or because she was supporting herself
against the door, the Lady of the Snow fell forward, almost into
the young girl's arms.
As she did so she exclaimed, with tears and sobs,
“Oh! my child!—my child!”
