Chapter 15 THE BEGINNING OF A SHADOW

'Looking, I saw

Where sorrow, like a shadow grim, did rise

Betwixt me and the sun.'

Autumn had come, mellow and gorgeous. The trees were turning to russet and amber and gold, and the swallows had long since flown away. The plums hung ripe and yellow upon the kitchen garden wall, and the apples were piled in rosy heaps in the orchard, ready