THE MOMENT
In the unnatural unbearableness of her anguish, she lost sight of objects as she passed them, she lost all memory of what she did.She did not know how long she had been out, or how far she had ridden.When the thought of time or distance vaguely flitted across her mind, it seemed that she had been riding for hours, and might have crossed one county and entered another.She had long left familiar places behind.
Riding through and inclosed by the mist, she, herself, might have been a wandering ghost, lost in unknown places.Where was he now--where was he now?
Afterwards she could not tell how or when it was that she found herself becoming conscious of the evidences that her horse had been ridden too long and hard, and that he was worn out with fatigue.She did not know that she had ridden round and round over the marshes, and had passed several times through the same lanes.Childe Harold, the sure of foot, actually stumbled, out of sheer weariness of limb.
Perhaps it was this which brought her back to earth, and led her to look around her with eyes which saw material objects with comprehension.She had reached the lonely places, indeed and the evening was drawing on.She was at the edge of the marsh, and the land about her was strange to her and desolate.
At the side of a steep lane, overgrown with grass, and seeming a mere cart-path, stood a deserted-looking, black and white, timbered cottage, which was half a ruin.Close to it was a dripping spinney, its trees forming a darkling background to the tumble-down house, whose thatch was rotting into holes, and its walls sagging forward perilously.The bit of garden about it was neglected and untidy, here and there windows were broken, and stuffed with pieces of ragged garments.
Altogether a sinister and repellent place enough.
She looked at it with heavy eyes.(Where was he now--where was he now?--This repeating itself in the far chambers of her brain.) Her sight seemed dimmed, not only by the mist, but by a sinking faintness which possessed her.She did not remember how little food she had eaten during more than twenty-four hours.Her habit was heavy with moisture, and clung to her body; she was conscious of a hot tremor passing over her, and saw that her hands shook as they held the bridle on which they had lost their grip.She had never fainted in her life, and she was not going to faint now--women did not faint in these days--but she must reach the cottage and dismount, to rest under shelter for a short time.No smoke was rising from the chimney, but surely someone was living in the place, and could tell her where she was, and give her at least water for herself and her horse.Poor beast! how wickedly she must have been riding him, in her utter absorption in her thoughts.He was wet, not alone with rain, but with sweat.He snorted out hot, smoking breaths.
She spoke to him, and he moved forward at her command.
He was trembling too.Not more than two hundred yards, and she turned him into the lane.But it was wet and slippery, and strewn with stones.His trembling and her uncertain hold on the bridle combined to produce disaster.He set his foot upon a stone which slid beneath it, he stumbled, and she could not help him to recover, so he fell, and only by Heaven's mercy not upon her, with his crushing, big-boned weight, and she was able to drag herself free of him before he began to kick, in his humiliated efforts to rise.But he could not rise, because he was hurt--and when she, herself, got up, she staggered, and caught at the broken gate, because in her wrenching leap for safety she had twisted her ankle, and for a moment was in cruel pain.
When she recovered from her shock sufficiently to be able to look at the cottage, she saw that it was more of a ruin than it had seemed, even at a short distance.Its door hung open on broken hinges, no smoke rose from the chimney, because there was no one within its walls to light a fire.It was quite empty.Everything about the place lay in dead and utter silence.In a normal mood she would have liked the mystery of the situation, and would have set about planning her way out of her difficulty.But now her mind made no effort, because normal interest in things had fallen away from her.
She might be twenty miles from Stornham, but the possible fact did not, at the moment, seem to concern her.(Where is he now--where is he now?) Childe Harold was trying to rise, despite his hurt, and his evident determination touched her.He was too proud to lie in the mire.She limped to him, and tried to steady him by his bridle.He was not badly injured, though plainly in pain.
"Poor boy, it was my fault," she said to him as he at last struggled to his feet."I did not know I was doing it.Poor boy!"He turned a velvet dark eye upon her, and nosed her forgivingly with a warm velvet muzzle, but it was plain that, for the time, he was done for.They both moved haltingly to the broken gate, and Betty fastened him to a thorn tree near it, where he stood on three feet, his fine head drooping.
She pushed the gate open, and went into the house through the door which hung on its hinges.Once inside, she stood still and looked about her.If there was silence and desolateness outside, there was within the deserted place a stillness like the unresponse of death.It had been long since anyone had lived in the cottage, but tramps or gipsies had at times passed through it.Dead, blackened embers lay on the hearth, a bundle of dried grass which had been slept on was piled in the corner, an empty nail keg and a wooden box had been drawn before the big chimney place for some wanderer to sit on when the black embers had been hot and red.
Betty gave one glance around her and sat down upon the box standing on the bare hearth, her head sinking forward, her hands falling clasped between her knees, her eyes on the brick floor.
