Yet she made an effort to turn the conversation,
and she succeeded; for the Master also had advanced farther than he
intended, and his conscience had instantly checked him when he found
himself on the verge of speaking of love to the daughter of Sir William
Ashton.
They now approached the hut of Old Alice, which had of late been
rendered more comfortable, and presented an appearance less picturesque,
perhaps, but far neater than before. The old woman was on her accustomed
seat beneath the weeping birch, basking, with the listless enjoyment of
age and infirmity, in the beams of the autumn sun. At the arrival of
her visitors she turned her head towards them. "I hear your step, Miss
Ashton," she said, "but the gentleman who attends you is not my lord,
your father."
"And why should you think so, Alice?" said Lucy; "or how is it possible
for you to judge so accurately by the sound of a step, on this firm
earth, and in the open air?"
"My hearing, my child, has been sharpened by my blindness, and I can now
draw conclusions from the slightest sounds, which formerly reached my
ears as unheeded as they now approach yours.
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