"Nonsense, you superstitious child!" answered Mr. Cardus, who was now recovering from his start. "The gauntlet knocked the door open, that was all. It is nothing but a mummied head; but, if you don't like it, I will send it to the British Museum to-morrow."
"Oh, please do, Reginald," answered Dorothy, who appeared quite unhinged.
So hurried had been their retreat from the room that everybody had forgotten "Hard-riding Atterleigh" sitting in the dark in the inglenook. But the bustle in the room had attracted him, and already, before they were gone, he had projected his large head covered with the tangled grey locks, and begun to stare about. Presently his eyes fell upon the crystal orbs, and then, to him, the orbs appeared to cease their wanderings and rest upon his eyes. For awhile the two heads stared at each other thus--the golden head without a body in the box, and the grey head that, thrust out as it were from the ingle-wall, /seemed/ to have no body either. They stared and stared, till at last the golden head got the mastery of the grey head, and the old man crept from his corner, crept down the room till he was almost beneath the baleful eyes, and /nodded, nodded, nodded/ at them.
And they, too, seemed to /nod, nod, nod/ at him. Then he retreated backwards as slowly as he had come, nodding all the while, till he came to where the broken assegai lay upon the table, and, taking it, thrust it up his sleeve. As he did so, the ray of light faded and the fiery eyes went out. It was as though the thick white lids and long eyelashes had dropped over them.
None of the other four returned to the sitting-room that night.
When he had recovered from his fright, Jeremy went into his little room, the same in which he used to stuff birds as a boy, and busied himself with his farm accounts. Mr. Cardus, Dorothy, and Ernest walked about together in the balmy moonlight, for, very shortly after the twilight had departed, the great harvest-moon came up and flooded the world with light. Mr. Cardus was in a talkative, excited mood that night. He talked about his affairs, which he had now finally wound up, and about Mary Atterleigh, mentioning little tricks of manner and voice which were reproduced in Dorothy. He talked too about Ernest's and Dorothy's marriage, and said what a comfort it was to him. Finally, about ten o'clock, he said that he was tired and going to bed.
"God bless you, my dears; sleep well! Good-night," he said. "We will settle about that new orchid-house to-morrow. Good-night, good-night."
Shortly afterwards Dorothy and Ernest also went to bed, reaching their room by a back entrance, for they neither of them felt inclined to come under the fire of the crystal eyes again, and soon they were asleep in each other's arms.
The minutes stole on one by one through the dead silence of the night, bearing their records with them to the archives of the past. Eleven o'clock came and fled away; midnight came too, and swept across the world. Everywhere--on land, sky, and sea--there was silence, nothing but silence sleeping in the moonlight.
/Hark!/ Oh, heavens, what was that!
One fearful, heartrending yell of agony, ringing all through the ancient house, rattling the casements, shaking the armour against the panelled walls, pulsing and throbbing in horrible notes out into the night, echoing and dying far away over the sea! Then silence again, silence sleeping in the moonlight.
They sprang from their beds, did every living soul beneath that roof, and rushed in their night-gear, men and women together, into the sitting-room. The crystal eyes seemed to be awake again, for the moon was up and played upon them, causing them now and then to flash out in gleams of opalescent light.
Somebody lit a candle, somebody missed Mr. Cardus; surely he could never have slept through that! Yes, he /had/ slept through it. They ran and tumbled, a confused mass of white, into the room where he lay. He was there sure enough, and he slept very sound, with a red gash in his throat, from which the blood fell in heavy drops, down, down to the ground.
They stood aghast, and as they stood, from the courtyard outside there came a sound of galloping hoofs. They knew the sound of the galloping; it was that of Ernest's great black stallion!
A mile or more away out on the marshes, just before you come to the well-known quicksands, which have, tradition says, swallowed so many unfortunates, and which shudder palpably at times and are unpleasant to look on, stands a lock-house, inhabited by one solitary man, who has charge of the sluice. On this very night it is necessary for him to open his sluice-gates at a particular moment, and now he stands awaiting that propitious time. He is an ancient mariner; his hands are in his pockets, his pipe is in his mouth, his eyes are fixed upon the sea. We have met him before. Suddenly he hears the sound of a powerful horse galloping furiously. He turns, and his hair begins to rise upon his head, for this is what he sees in the bright moonlight:
Fast, fast towards him thunders a great coal-black horse, snorting with mingled rage and terror, and on its bare back there sits a man with a grip of iron--an old man, for his grey locks stream out behind him--who waves above his head the fragment of a spear.
On they come. Before them is the wide sluice; if they are mortal, they will turn or plunge into it. No; the great black horse gathers himself, and springs into the air.
By heaven, he has cleared it! No horse ever took that leap before, or will again. On at whirlwind speed towards the shuddering quicksand two hundred yards away!
/Splash!/ Horse and man are in it, making the moist mass shake and tremble for twenty yards round. The bright moonlight shows it all. The horse shrieks in fear and agony, as only a horse can; the man on his back waves the spear.
The horse vanishes, the man vanishes; the spear glitters an instant longer in the moonlight, and then vanishes too. They have all vanished for ever.
They have all vanished, and again the perfect silence sleeps in the moonlight.
"Bust me!" says the ancient one, aloud, and shaking with a mortal dread; "bust me, I have stood still and seed many a queer thing, but I never seed a thing like that!" Then he turned and fled fast as his old legs would carry him, forgetful of Dutch cheeses and of sluice-gates, forgetful of everything except that demon horse and man.
Thus ended "Hard-riding Atterleigh's" maddest gallop, and thus, too, ended the story of Mr. Cardus and his revenge.
CHAPTER X
DOROTHY'S TRIUMPH
Some years passed before Eva Plowden returned to Kesterwick, and then she was carried thither. Alive she did not return, nor during all these years did she and Ernest ever meet.
They buried her, in obedience to her last wishes, in the churchyard, where lay generation upon generation of her ancient race, and the daisies grew above her head. Twice had they bloomed above her before Sir Ernest Kershaw stood by the spot hallowed with the presence of what once enshrined the spirit of the woman he had loved.
Ernest was now getting well into middle life, and Dorothy's bright hair was slightly lined with grey, when they stood that summer evening by Eva's grave. Many things had happened to the pair since Mr. Cardus's tragic death. They had children born to them--some they had lost, some remained--honest English lads and lasses, with their father's eyes. They had enjoyed great wealth, and spent it royally, giving to all who needed. They had drunk deep of the cup of this world's joys and sorrows. Ernest had gone into Parliament for a couple of years, and made something of a name there. Then, impatient for the active life of other days, he had accepted a high Colonial appointment, for which, notwithstanding his blindness, his wealth and parliamentary reputation eminently fitted him. Now he was just about to leave to fill the governorship of one of the Australian colonies.
Long years had passed, many things had happened; and yet as he stood by that heap of turf, which he could not see, it seemed but yesterday when--and he sighed.
"Not quite cured yet, Ernest?" said Dorothy, interrogatively.
"Yes, Dorothy," he answered, with a little sigh, "I think I am cured. At any rate," he went on, as she took his hand to lead him away