Crossing it he entered the park by the sea gate; she
had to enter it by the tunnel that passed under the same road.
She approached the grated door, unlocked it, and looked in with
a shudder. It was dark, the other .end of it being obscured by
trees, and the roots of the hill on whose top stood the temple of
the winds. Through the tunnel blew what seemed quite another wind
--one of death, from regions beneath. She drew her shawl, one end
of which was rolled about her baby, closer around them both ere
she entered. Never before had she set foot within the place, and
a strange horror of it filled her: she did not know that by that
passage, on a certain lovely summer night, Lord Meikleham had issued
to meet her on the sands under the moon. The sea was not terrible
to her; she knew all its ways nearly as well as Malcolm knew the
moods of Kelpie; but the earth and its ways were less known to her,
and to turn her face towards it and enter by a little door into its
bosom was like a visit to her grave. But she gathered her strength,
entered with a shudder, passed in growing hope and final safety
through it, and at the other end came out again into the light,
only the cold of its death seemed to cling to her still. But the
day had grown colder; the clouds that, seen or unseen, ever haunt
the winter sun, had at length caught and shrouded him, and through
the gathering vapours he looked ghastly.
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