Page:The Mystery of Madeline Le Blanc (1900).djvu/106

106 episode had died, and when the old stone house had sunk further into the earth and become to several generations of children the abode of the evil spirit, and when fragments of the foregoing narrative had become a tradition, and time had spread oblivion over what once seethed and throbbed with human interest, there came to the town two women: one, small, slender and white with age; the other, younger, but already passed the meridian of life. They had in their possession a deed to the old stone house; into which, after some repairs were made, they moved. They turned a deaf ear to every admonition that the house had been many years ago the abode of sinister deeds, and also baffled every effort of inquisitive persons to disclose their identity.

If anybody of the town ever saw squarely into the face of the older of these two women, it was never known; for with such studied care did she avoid the gaze of any passer-by that nothing save her small dark figure and snow-white hair were ever seen, Occasionally, she wandered in the cemetery across the way; but beyond this her steps rarely went further than the hedge that