All Along The River

MP3 Audio CD. All Along The River

CHAPTER I.

"THE RAIN SET EARLY IN TO-NIGHT."


It had been raining all the morning, and it was raining still, in that
feeble and desultory manner which presages a change of some kind, when
the postman came with the long-expected Indian letter.

He was later than usual. It was nearly two o'clock, and Isola had been
watching for him since one, watching with an unread book in her lap,
listening for the click of the gate. She had been sitting by the open
window, looking out at the wet landscape, the glistening hedgerow and
dull grey river, with the great, green hill beyond, a steep slope of
meadow land, dotted with red cattle, and so divided by hedgerows, as to
look like a Titanic chessboard.

At last she heard the familiar tread of the postman's heavy boots, and
saw his shining oilskin hat moving above the edge of the hollies, and
heard the click of the iron latch as he came into the little garden.

She called to him from the window, and he came tramping across the
sodden grass and put three letters into her outstretched hand.

One from her married sister in Hans Place. That would keep. One from an
old schoolfellow. That would keep. And one--the long-looked-for Indian
letter, which she tore open eagerly, and read hurriedly, devouring
the close lines, in the neat, black penmanship, with its decided
up and down strokes, and legible characters, so firm, so strong, so
straightforward, like the nature of the man who wrote the letter.