The earl's promise Author:J. H. Riddell Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: 47 CHAPTER III. SEVEN YEAES AFTER. High noon once again at Kingslough; high noon, with a leaden sky, a drizzling rain falling, the streets ankle deep in... more » mud, the side paths sloppy and dirty. Altogether a miserable noon—the sea out a long way, as was its wont to go at Kings- lough when low tide-time came; an expanse of grey, sad-looking shore; the water still and sullen; the hills the only bit of colour in the landscape, for the foliage of the fir- trees in the distant woods looked almost black by contrast with the leafless branches amongst which they reared their heads. ISTo sunlight dancing on the waves; no shifting shadows succeeded by bright patches of brightness coining and going upon the uplands; no mellow haze softening the distance; no purple bloom softening the scene into a dream of fairyland. At the foot of its hills, Kingslough lay crouching and shivering its houses together; houses in which every blind in the lower windows was drawn close, or the shutters closed, in token of—respect, the people would have said. Let the word go for what it was worth. It could not now matter to Lord Glendare—in evidence of whose death the weather itself seemed to have put on mourning—whether the men he had ground down into the earth loved or hated, respected or despised, his memory. He was gone—by the road winding inland, along the Glendare Parade—closely-shut houses on one side, and the dark, bare shore, with the leaden-coloured sea reflecting a leaden sky, on the other—up the steep hillside they Avere about to bear the mortal remains of the earl to their last earthly home. Nearly seven years had passed since his previous visit to Ireland, and during that time progress set a weak, uncertain foot, even in Kingslough. Men had arisen who, from first whispering dou...« less