His way up from Redmire was by the road along which she had driven
on the evening of her arrival, the road that dipped into a wooded
glen, where a stream tumbled amid rocks and boulders, over
smooth-worn slabs and shining pebbles, from the moor down to the
river of the dale. He might not come this way. She hoped--she
trusted Destiny.
She stood by the crossing of the beck. The flood of yesterday had
fallen; the water was again shallow at this spot, but nearly all the
stepping-stones had been swept away. For help at such times, a crazy
little wooden bridge spanned the current a few yards above. Irene
brushed through the long grass and the bracken, mounted on to the
bridge, and, leaning over the old bough which formed a rail, let the
voice of the beck soothe her impatience.
Here one might linger for hours, in perfect solitude; very rarely in
the day was this happy stillness broken by a footfall, a voice, or
the rumbling of a peasant's cart. A bird twittered, a breeze
whispered in the branches; ever and ever the water kept its hushing
note.
But now someone was coming. Not with audible footstep; not down the
road at which Irene frequently glanced; the intruder approached from
the lower part of the glen, along the beckside, now walking in soft
herbage, now striding from stone to stone, sometimes lifting the
bough of a hazel or a rowan that hung athwart his path.
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