and was about to lean to look more

The priest touched his shoulder, and Rufus stood up. Catherine stood up. Their father had not, of course not, Rufus thought, he had not moved, but he looked to have changed. Although he lay in such calm and beauty, and grandeur, it looked to Rufus as if he had been flung down and left on the street, and as if he were a very successfully disguised stranger. He felt a pang of distress and of disbelief and was about to lean to look more closely, when he felt a light hand on his head, his mother’s, he knew, and heard her say, “Now children”; and they were conveyed to the hall door. The piano, he saw, was shut. “Now Mother wants to stay just a minute or two,” she told them. “She’ll be with you directly. So you go straight into the East Room, with Aunt Hannah, and wait for me.” She touched their faces, and noiselessly closed the door. Crossing to the East Room they became aware that they were not alone in the dark hall. Andrew stood by the hat rack, holding to the banister, and his rigid, weeping eyes, shining with fury, struck to the roots of their souls like ice, so that they hastened into the room where their great-aunt sat in an unmoving rocking chair with her hands in her lap, the sunless light glazing her lenses, frostlike upon her hair. They heard feet on the front stairs, and knew it was their grandfather. They heard him turn to go down the hall and then they heard his subdued, surprised voice: “Andrew? Where’s Poll?” And their uncle’s voice, cold, close to his ear: “In—there—with—Father—Jackson.” “Unh!” they heard their grandfather growl. Their Aunt Hannah hurried towards the door. “Praying.” “Unh!” he growled again. Their Aunt Hannah quickly closed the door, and hurried back to her chair.