pounding faster than the hoof beats. But the animal she rode, though a
good one, was no match for the great infuriated beast which she pursued.
Presently she came to a wooded corner where the road forked thrice, and
beyond, not without difficulty,--brought her sweating mare to a stand.
The quality of her fear changed from wild terror to cold dread. A hermit
thrush, in the wood near by, broke the silence with a song inconceivably
sweet. At last she went back to the farm-house, hoping against hope that
Hugh might have returned by another road. But he was not there. The
farmer was still nonchalantly whittling.

"Oh, how could you let any one get on a horse like that?" she cried.

"You're his wife, ain't you?" he asked.

Something in the man's manner seemed to compel her to answer, in spite of
the form of the question.

"I am Mrs. Chiltern," she said.

He was looking at her with an expression that she found incomprehensible.
His glance was penetrating, yet here again she seemed to read compassion.
He continued to gaze at her, and presently, when he spoke, it was as
though he were not addressing her at all.

"You put me in mind of a young girl I used to know," he said; "seems like
a long time ago. You're pretty, and you're young, and ye didn't know what
you were doin,' I'll warrant. Lost your head. He has a way of gittin'
'em--always had."

Honora did not answer. She would have liked to have gone away, but that