When Mrs. Wedge had ceased talking, there was perfect silence in the room again, and the footsteps were heard descending the stair. Occasionally there was a painful pause, but they soon went on again, and were heard no more.
"Poor Helen," Mrs. Wedge said, wiping her eyes, "how reluctantly she leaves the little crib."
Mrs. Wedge soon followed the ghost of poor Helen down the stair, carrying Betty in her arms; and as Dorris stood on the landing lighting them down, he thought, as they passed into the shadow in the lower hall, that poor Helen had found her child, and was leaving the house forever, content to remain in her grave at last.
Annie Benton had said that she usually practised once a week in the church; and during the lonely days after his first meeting with her, Allan Dorris began to wonder when he should see her again. The sight of her, and the sound of her voice, and her magic music, had afforded him a strange pleasure, and he thought about her so much that his mind experienced relief from the thoughts that had made him restless and ill at ease. But he heard nothing of her, except from Mrs. Wedge, who was as loud in her praise as ever; though he looked for her as he rode about on his business affairs, and a few times he had walked by her father's house, after dark, and looked at its substantial exterior.
There was something about the girl which fascinated him. It may have been only the music, but certainly he longed for her appearance, and listened attentively for notice of her presence whenever he walked in his yard, which was his custom so much of late that he had worn paths under the trees; for had he secured all the business in Davy's Bend he would still have had a great deal of time on his hands.
During these weeks he sometimes accused himself of being in love with a girl he had seen but once, and laughed at the idea as absurd and preposterous; but this did not drive thoughts of Annie Benton out of his mind, for he stopped to listen at every turn for sounds of her presence. After listening during the hours of the day when he was not occupied, he usually walked in the path for a while at night, hoping it might be possible that she had changed her hours, and would come to practise after the cares and duties of the day were over. He could see from his own window that the church was dark; but he had little to do, so he took a turn in the path down by the wall to convince himself that she was not playing softly, without a light, to give her fancy free rein. But he was always disappointed; and, after finding that his watching was hopeless, he went out at the iron gate in front, and walked along the roads until he recovered from his disappointment sufficiently to enter his own home.