But she was content that night, or as nearly content as it was possible to be with such a profound disturbance and trouble in her being. She had her chair brought out, and her cushion and footstool, her stocking and her book, as in the old days, which had been so short a time before and yet seemed so far off. It was not so fine a night as it had usually been, she thought _then_. The light had not that opal tint, that silvery pearl-like radiance. There was a shadow as of a cloud in it, and the sky, though showing no broken lines of vapour, was grey and a little heavy, charged with the rain which seemed gathering after long drought over the longing country. Esk, running low, wanted the rain, and so did the thirsty trees, too great to be watered like the flowers, which had begun to have a dusty look. But in the meantime the evening was warm, very warm and very still, waiting for the opening up of the fountains in the skies. Mrs Ogilvy sat there musing, almost as she had mused of old: only instead of the wistful longing and desire in her heart then, she had now an ever-present ache, the sense of a deep wound, the only partially stilled and always quivering tremor of a great fear. Considering that these things were, however, and could not be put away, she was very calm. She had been sitting here for some time, reading a little of her book, knitting a great deal of her stocking, which did not interfere with her reading, thinking a great deal, sometimes dropping the knitting into her lap to think the more, to pray a little--one running into the other almost unconsciously--when she suddenly heard behind her a movement in the hedge. It was a high holly hedge, as has been already said, very well trimmed, and impenetrable, almost as high as a man. When a man walked up the slope from the road, only his hat, or if he were a tall man, his head, could be seen over it. The hedge ran round on the right-hand side to the wall of the house, shutting out the garden, which lay on the other slope, as on the left it encircled the little platform, with its grass-plot and flower-borders and modest carriage-drive in front of the Hewan. It was in the garden behind that green wall that the sound was, which a month ago would not have disturbed her, which was probably only Janet going to the well or Andrew putting his watering-cans away. Mrs Ogilvy, however, more easily startled now, looked round quickly, but saw nothing. The light was stealing away, the rain was near; it was that rather than the evening which made the atmosphere so dim. The noise had made her heart beat a little, though she felt sure it was nothing; it made her think of going in, though she could still with a slight effort see to read. It was foolish to be disturbed by such a trifle. She had never been frightened before: a step, a sound at the gate, had been used, before Robert came back, to awaken her to life and expectation, to a constantly disappointed but never extinguished hope.