Ronald Morton | Page 7

of

Eastling, which perhaps obtained its name from lying east of the chief
habitation of the lords of the domain, Eastling being a corruption of
Eastlying. Such was the view on which Hilda Wardhill was
occasionally turning her gaze, though her eyes were more frequently
fixed on the pages of a large volume lying open on a dark oak reading
desk fixed in the recess, and so placed that the last rays of that precious
sunlight which so soon departs in the long winter season of the North,
might fall full upon it. The room was of an octagon shape, with dark
oak wainscoting and ceiling; the chairs were of a suitable character,
mostly with high upright backs, rudely carved, as were some
book-shelves, which occupied two of the sides, while a massive table,
supported by sea monsters, or at all events by creatures of fish-like
form, stood in the centre; another table of similar character stood
against the side of the room with writing materials on it, and there was
a sofa of antique form, and two large chests of some dark wood, with
brass clasps and plates on the lids and sides, so tarnished however by
the sea air, as scarcely to be discerned as brass. A second high narrow
window, with a lattice, faced towards the west and north, so that
persons standing at it could, by leaning forward, look completely up the
voe. Thus, from this turret chamber, a view could be obtained on every
side, except on that looking inland, or rather over the island.
On one of the eight sides there was, however, a small door in the
panelling, which opened on a spiral staircase leading to the very
summit of the tower, where, as has been said, a gun was placed, and
whence a complete view was obtained over every portion of the island,
extending far away over the sea beyond, to the Out Skerries, a rocky
group so called; and the distant shores of the large island of Yell. As
the roof could only be reached by passing through the chamber below,
it was completely private to the fair occupant as long as she chose to
close the ingress to her own room.
Seldom has a more beautiful picture been portrayed to the mind's eye of
the most imaginative of painters, than that which Hilda Wardhill
presented as she sat at the window of her turret chamber, either leaning
over the volume which occupied her attention, or gazing out on the
calm ocean, her thoughts evidently still engaged in the subject of her

studies.
At length she rose, and was about to close the window, when her eye
fell on a vast towering mass of white, gliding slowly from the
northward down Eastling Sound. She looked more than once,
mistrusting her senses, and inclined to believe that it was some
phantom of the deep, described in wild romances, often her study,
which she beheld, till another glance assured her, as the object drew
nearer that it was a large ship far larger than had ever been known
during her recollection to anchor in the Sound. With speed which
seemed like magic, the white canvas disappeared, and the tall masts and
the yards and the light tracery of the rigging could only dimly be traced
against the clear sky.
Whence the stranger had come, or for what object, Hilda could not tell,
but still she had a feeling--how communicated she did not inquire--that
the event portended some great change in her own fate. Painful
forebodings of evil came crowding like mocking phantoms around her.
She tried with the exercise of her own strong will to banish them. In
vain she strove--the more they seemed to mock her power. She felt as if
she could almost have shrieked out in the agony of her mortal struggle,
till her proud spirit quailed and trembled with unwonted fears. Again
the clock tolled forth a solitary sound, which vibrated strangely on her
overwrought nerves, and seemed more sonorous than usual. She
pressed her hand upon her brow, then by an effort she seemed by a
single gasp to recover herself, and, closing the window, retired to her
sleeping chamber in that part of the house in the immediate
neighbourhood of her favourite tower.
At an early hour the lady of the castle was on foot. She at once
ascended to the summit of her tower, and gazed eagerly up the Sound,
half expecting to find that she had been deceived by her imagination on
the previous night, and that the ship she had seen was but a creation of
the brain. There, however, floated the beautiful fabric, but there was not
the slightest movement or sign of life on board. At all events, it seemed
improbable that she would