there was nobody stirring. Here was my advantage, here was just

such a conjuncture as Stewart had counselled me to profit by, and I

ran by the side of the mill-lade, fetched about beyond the east

corner of the wood, threaded through the midst of it, and returned

to the west selvage, whence I could again command the path, and yet

be myself unseen. Again it was all empty, and my heart began to

rise.

For more than an hour I sat close in the border of the trees, and

no hare or eagle could have kept a more particular watch. When

that hour began the sun was already set, but the sky still all

golden and the daylight clear; before the hour was done it had

fallen to be half mirk, the images and distances of things were

mingled, and observation began to be difficult. All that time not

a foot of man had come east from Silvermills, and the few that had

gone west were honest countryfolk and their wives upon the road to

bed. If I were tracked by the most cunning spies in Europe, I

judged it was beyond the course of nature they could have any

jealousy of where I was: and going a little further home into the

wood I lay down to wait for Alan.

The strain of my attention had been great, for I had watched not

the path only, but every bush and field within my vision. That was

now at an end. The moon, which was in her first quarter, glinted a

little in the wood; all round there was a stillness of the country;

and as I lay there on my back, the next three or four hours, I had

a fine occasion to review my conduct.

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