Half-a-dozen years passed away, and Mr. and Mrs. Lodge's marriedexperience sank into prosiness, and worse. The farmer was usuallygloomy and silent: the woman whom he had wooed for her grace andbeauty was contorted and disfigured in the left limb; moreover, shehad brought him no child, which rendered it likely that he would bethe last of a family who had occupied that valley for some twohundred years. He thought of Rhoda Brook and her son; and fearedthis might be a judgment from heaven upon him.

　　The once blithe-hearted and enlightened Gertrude was changing intoan irritable, superstitious woman, whose whole time was given toexperimenting upon her ailment with every quack remedy she cameacross. She was honestly attached to her husband, and was eversecretly hoping against hope to win back his heart again byregaining some at least of her personal beauty. Hence it arose thather closet was lined with bottles, packets, and ointment-pots ofevery description--nay, bunches of mystic herbs, charms, and booksof necromancy, which in her schoolgirl time she would have ridiculedas folly.

　　'Damned if you won't poison yourself with these apothecary messesand witch mixtures some time or other,' said her husband, when hiseye chanced to fall upon the multitudinous array.

　　She did not reply, but turned her sad, soft glance upon him in suchheart-swollen reproach that he looked sorry for his words, andadded, 'I only meant it for your good, you know, Gertrude.'

　　'I'll clear out the whole lot, and destroy them,' said she huskily,'and try such remedies no more!'

　　'You want somebody to cheer you,' he observed. 'I once thought ofadopting a boy; but he is too old now. And he is gone away I don'tknow where.'

　　She guessed to whom he alluded; for Rhoda Brook's story had in thecourse of years become known to her; though not a word had everpassed between her husband and herself on the subject. Neither hadshe ever spoken to him of her visit to Conjuror Trendle, and of whatwas revealed to her, or she thought was revealed to her, by thatsolitary heath-man.

　　She was now five-and-twenty; but she seemed older.

　　'Six years of marriage, and only a few months of love,' shesometimes whispered to herself. And then she thought of theapparent cause, and said, with a tragic glance at her witheringlimb, 'If I could only again be as I was when he first saw me!'

　　She obediently destroyed her nostrums and charms; but there remaineda hankering wish to try something else--some other sort of curealtogether. She had never revisited Trendle since she had beenconducted to the house of the solitary by Rhoda against her will;but it now suddenly occurred t............