Weird Sisters

“ It most forcibly arrests the traveller’s attention, causing him to doubt whether, within the short interval of perhaps six or seven miles, he may believe his senses, which pourtray to him a change from vigorous and personable manhood, to a decrepid, hideous, and dwarfish, state: more resemblant of the Weird Sisters than our imaginations can conceive, or than our best comedians can represent. ”

“ The former are creatures of flesh and blood, possessing power, indeed, to inflict disease, and to execute more than common mischief, but very subordinate instruments of evil, when compared with the spiritual essence and mysterious sublimity of the Weird Sisters, who are the authors not only of nameless deeds, but who are nameless themselves, who float upon the midnight storm, direct the elemental strife, and, more than this, who wield the passions and the thoughts of man. ”

“ You are not afraid to go."
"I should like to go. There is nothing I would like better. It will be an adventure."
When they were there he said: "I am glad we came. We are promised a glorious view presently. There is the moon rising."
"The moon does not rise there. It rises here," pointing.
"Then there must be a fire."
"That is the direction of the Manor House——."
THE END. CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS, GREAT NEW STREET, FETTER LANE, E.C.
NOTICE.
Now ready, at every Library in the Kingdom,
THE MYSTERY OF KILLARD. A New Novel.
By RICHARD DOWLING, Author of "The Weird Sisters." In Three Vols. ”

“ So I had seen "the need" wrong. The lamp of a young girl's hope, held up in her little world, to help her to find a mate—that light was pale beside the red glare of this fierce demand from men.
And the people who knew least went on saying it wasn't true. And the people who knew most said: there are many thousand "lost sisters" in London.
Who would help me to find mine?—or to sleep once more, knowing Bettina safely dead!
Nothing to hope from the foggy, self-bemused mystic, whose face alternated with that of the nurse in and out of my dreaming and my waking. ”

“ How many bosom friends have you, Miss Watson?"
"None, except my sister," said Emma, amused.
"Your sister! oh, fie! no one thinks of making a friend of a sister—that is quite a burlesque—a friend's brother is, of course, a favorite—but one's own brothers or sisters are quite out of the question." ”

“ Jenny clasped her hands, as she exclaimed: “No one knows how I have always longed to have a sister. I have never had friends—girl friends, I mean—I have been Miss Dearborn’s only pupil, but often and often I have pretended that I had a sister about my own age. I would wake up in the night, the way girls do in books, and confide my secrets to a make-believe sister. Then, when I went on long tramps alone up in the foothills, I pretended that my sister was with me and we made plans together.” ”

“ They will put on their spectacles and turn you round to the light, to see if you look like the Carters, or who you are like; won’t they, grandma? Are we going to that queer little town where those three sisters live, the ones who are so old? Annis, they are so funny; the youngest one is nearly seventy, and her two older sisters always treat her as if she were such a young, frivolous thing that they are afraid she might elope with the milkman, or do some equally giddy thing, if they didn’t keep a strict watch over her. ”

“ I said, "you're not going to hire the Sisters Sprightly or anything, are you?"
"No, we are not," said Cecilia; "not the Sisters Sprightly nor the Brothers Bung. We are going to do it ourselves."
"What—a Sisters Sprightly Act? Have a little shame, Cecilia. What will Christopher think when he sees his mother in a ballet skirt, kicking about all over the drawing-room?" ”

“ The most disagreeable thing about having sisters is that one always is being included with them. No one speaks of what I like or wish, or what Lina likes or Via or Eda. One always talks about 'the girls' in a group, as if we possessed the same tastes and ideas! ”

“ There was sympathy expressed on Sister Eliza's homely features as she replied:
"No wonder, Sister Catherine, after what you have been suffering. But brighter days will come."
"Never, never! Sister Eliza—but I have sent for you to learn the whole truth. What has happened—what do they say now?"
[281]
"Fools and cowards!" exclaimed the boarding-house keeper, contemptuously; "they do not know their own minds."
"I thought it would be so; and what do they say? Tell me all!"
"The Sisters are in a very discontented mood; they grumble at everything. ”

“ When her work was over she would read, or play on the harpsichord, or sing as she sat at her spinning wheel.
Her two sisters did not know what to do with themselves. They would get up at ten, [88] and idle away the whole day, fretting for the loss of their fine clothes and gay parties. “Do but see that girl!” they would say to one another. “What stupid, low tastes she has to be contented with this kind of life!” But their father thought differently, and loved his youngest daughter more than ever. ”

“ THE three old sisters, Rachel and Nancy and Camilla, lived in the house in which they had been born. They were very old in years—the youngest was nearly seventy—but they were, after all, the most youthful maidens in the village. Not a child dragging her doll-carriage past their windows, not a young girl strolling by in the twilight on her lover's arm, was as young as they, for the youth in them had actually triumphed over age, and gained, as it were, a species of immortality in this world. ”

“ She brushed the ends of cotton from her dress, walked across to the door, and disappeared through the doorway with a pantomimic gesture of distaste. At the other side she paused and stood facing the invalid in silent embarrassment, for his cheeks were flushed, and he looked so supremely uncomfortable that it was evident he had overheard the loud-toned conversation which had been carried on between the brother and sisters. ”

“ First came the brown baby, then Agoonack, Gemila, Jeannette, Pen-se, Manenko, and Louise. Seven little sisters I have called them, but Marnie exclaims: "How can they be sisters when some are black, some brown, and some white; when one lives in the warm country and another in the cold, and Louise upon the shores of the Rhine? Sallie and I are sisters, because we have the same father and live here together in the same house by the seaside; but as for those seven children, I can't believe them to be sisters at all." ”

“ When in society she never seemed like one of the herd, or to take the slightest interest in what was going on. She went through her dancing mechanically, and always seemed in the clouds, or, as her sisters would say, "wool-gathering."
It was easy to see from the first that no very sister-like feeling existed between the two elder sisters and their younger one. Even the parents preferred their two elder girls to their youngest daughter. ”

“ She enjoyed being read aloud to; she had great delight in her nephews and nieces; but most of all she appreciated the opportunity of uninterrupted intercourse with her sister. They were again the "Mary and Bessie" of youthful days; not friends learning to know and love each other, but sisters with a wealth of buried recollections to be brought out to the light of day; interests, tastes, and affections in common; only a spark, an electric flash of memory, needed to illuminate the whole. ”

“ There were few whom they knew by sight; none to speak to, amongst all the company; some who passed bestowed a stare, some put up their eye-glasses, and some their lips, as they saw the four sisters unattended by any gentleman walking together. ”

“ Well, he could scarcely have told you himself, for he was so completely overwhelmed that he stood gazing stupidly, like a cow at a painted barn-door. But beautiful—oh, beautiful, beyond all conception, was that which he saw. That was the reason he stood speechless, with open mouth and staring eyes. Of course, now you can guess what it was. It was none other than the Sister of the Sun. She was lying upon her bed, sleeping sweetly, like a child that is taking an after-dinner nap. ”

“ Is it not a disgraceful thing that you should betray the sweet creature whose childlike embarrassment charmed us this morning—of whom you yourself said, as we came home, that she reminded you of your lovely sister—that you should betray her, I say, into the power of the wildest of all the profligates I ever met—to this monster, whose pleasures are the unspeakable, whose boast is vice? ”

“ The suitors to her sisters, without condescending to excuse their infidelity by the slightest pretext, fell in love with her, and attracted by the power of her charms, deserted, without a blush, their former mistresses. Insensible to the marked attentions of a crowd of adorers, she neglected nothing that could discourage them and induce them to return to the previous objects of their affection; but, notwithstanding all her care, she could not escape the jealousy of her sisters. ”

“ When she spoke her voice sounded strained and unnatural. “Si Warner, do yo’ mean to tell me our Jenny has gone to fetch eggs for her very own sister an’ her friends? They’re likely to meet up wi’ each other now, arter all these years, an’ neither will know who the other really is. Oh, the pity of it, that one of ’em should have all that money can buy, and the other of ’em ridin’ around peddlin’ eggs and honey.” ”

“ Sophia, the eldest, about nineteen, was swinging a sister about two years younger, a very fine, fully developed young woman. Indeed, all three sisters were finer women and more beautiful than the average of young ladies. ”

“ And who could they have in their rich homes more lovable than Granny Sue and Grandpa Si? There couldn’t be any one more lovable in all the land. Then the watcher wondered which one of the girls was Harold P-J’s sister. “Proud and domineering,” Miss O’Hara had said that she was. Maybe she was that tall girl who had drawn apart from the rest with two companions. She carried herself haughtily and there was a smile on her face that Jenny did not like. ”

“ The childhood's playmate feeds the brother's love, and becomes, even then, his "blessing." The very thought of the absent sister is like a "flash of light" cheering the loneliness of college chambers. ”

“ There is nothing so exquisite left on earth. They are classics." Most eminently of all, they were Sisters. A childhood of strange peril and suffering, in which their hearts clung so close together that they grew into one, had fitted naturally dissimilar natures into an utter harmony of desire and deed. ”

“ The three sisters, Mary, Gwendolen and Alice, daughters of James Cartaret, the Vicar of Garth, were sitting there in the dining-room behind the yellow blind, doing nothing. In their supine, motionless attitudes they seemed to be waiting for something to happen, to happen so soon that, if there had been anything to do, it was not worth their while doing it. ”

“ When at last she ventured to look up, she saw that her sister's head had drooped against the pillow, and that she was sleeping quietly. Her relaxed hand still held the jonquils, but it was evident that they had awakened no memories; she had dozed off almost as soon as Johnny had given them to her. ”

“ After a time he spoke aloud his own thoughts. “Jeanette, that is what your teacher called you. It reminds me of my sister’s name somewhat.” He hesitated. He was on dangerous ground. He must be very careful of what he said. The girl turned toward him glowingly. “How lucky you are, Harold, to have a real sister. She must be a good pal for you. Is she to be at home soon?”
“Yes, tomorrow.” The boy hesitated, then he said slowly, thinking ahead: “Jenny, Mother and I feel that we haven’t brought Gwyn up just right. We have helped her to be proud and selfish. I’m going to ask you a favor. ”

“ Her eyes rested a moment on the blotched “Bunner Sisters” above the empty window of the shop; then they travelled on to the overflowing foliage of the Square, above which was the church tower with the dial that had marked the hours for the sisters before Ann Eliza had bought the nickel clock. She looked at it all as though it had been the scene of some unknown life, of which the vague report had reached her: she felt for herself the only remote pity that busy people accord to the misfortunes which come to them by hearsay. ”

“ Think of the sisters, living along with a hidden heart-ache, nursing in secret the knowledge, that somewhere in the world were those dear to them, from whom they were shut out by a bar-sinister terribly real, and for whose welfare, with all the generous truth of a sister's feeling, they would barter everything, yet who were in an unending danger! ”

“ But the old woman had no intention of telling the girl she so loved that she could not bear the thought of having her act as a servant to her own sister, Gwynette. And so she replied with an assumed cheeriness: “Just a notion, dearie, like as not. I feel that our gal is as good, and heaps better’n a lot of them seminary pupils, and I guess I sort of don’t like the idea of you waitin’ on ’em.” Then anxiously: “It won’t happen again, will it, Jenny?” ”

“ How, my dear, my incomparable sister—how could I repress feelings of vengeance and of resentment against all my neighbours, of whom there is not one who did not accelerate my downfall, and will not share in our spoils? ”

“ I kissed both, each used to say, "Don't tell my sister," and ask, "Have you kissed my sister?" I was naturally cunning about women, and my mother said, she must get rid of them.
The youngest was often dancing my little sister round in the room, then swinging herself round, and making cheeses with her petticoats. As I got better, I would lay on the rug with a pillow, and my back to the light reading, and say it rested me better, to be on the floor, but in hope of seeing her legs as she made cheeses. ”