"It is easier going this way, don't you find it so? The wind
helps us forward."
"It helps me too much," said Ellen; "I wish it wouldn't be
quite so very kind. Why, Miss Alice, I have enough to do to
hold myself together, sometimes. It almost makes me run,
though I am so very tired."
"Well, it is better than having it in our faces, at any rate.
Tired you are, I know, and must be. We shall want to rest all
day tomorrow, shan't we?"
"Oh, I don't know!" said Ellen, sighing; "I shall be glad when
we begin. How long do you think it will be, Miss Alice, before
we get to Mrs. Van Brunt's?"
"My dear child, I cannot tell you. I have not the least notion
whereabouts we are. I can see no way-marks, and I cannot judge
at all of the rate at which we have come."
"But what if we should have passed it in this darkness?" said
Ellen.
"No, I don't think that," said Alice, though a cold doubt
struck her mind at Ellen's words; "I think we shall see the
glimmer of Mrs. Van Brunt's friendly candle, by-and-by."
But more uneasily and more keenly now she stove to see that
glimmer through the darkness; strove till the darkness seemed
to press painfully upon her eyeballs, and she almost doubted
her being able to see any light if light there were; it was
all blank thick darkness still. She began to question
anxiously with herself which side of the house was Mrs.
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