Even
the Shorter Catechism was not the instrument of torture which it had
been wont to be. The cords of the rack were not strained so tight as
heretofore.
But the cool bright mornings, and the frosty evenings, with the pale
green sky after sundown, spoke to the heart of Alec of a coming loss.
Not that Kate had ever shown that she loved him, so that he even felt a
restless trouble in her presence which had not been favourable to his
recovery. Yet as he lay in the gloaming, and watched those crows flying
home, they seemed to be bearing something away with them on their black
wings; and as the light sank and paled on the horizon, and the stars
began to condense themselves into sparks amid the sea of green, like
those that fleet phosphorescent when the prow of the vessel troubles
the summer sea, and then the falling stars of September shot across the
darkening sky, he felt that a change was near, that for him winter was
coming before its time. And the trees saw from their high watch-tower
the white robe of winter already drifting up above the far horizon on
the wind that followed his footsteps, and knew what that wind would be
when it howled tormenting over those naked fields.
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