from Yew Nook, but only to be reached, on
account of its precipitous character, by a
round-about path. Thither she steered, defying
wind and snow; guided by here a thorn-
tree, there an old doddered oak, which had
not quite lost their identity under the
whelming mask of snow. Now and then she
stopped to listen; but never a word or sound
heard she, till right from where the copse-
wood grew thick and tangled at the base of
the rock, round which she was winding, she
heard a moan. In to the brake—all snow in
appearance, almost a plain of snow looked
on from the little eminence where she
stood—she plunged, breaking down the bush,
stumbling, bruising herself, fighting her way;
her lantern held between her teeth, and she
herself using head as well as hands to butt
away a passage, at whatever cost of bodily
injury. As she climbed or staggered, owing
to the unevenness of the snow-covered
ground, where the briars and weeds of years
were tangled and matted together, her foot
felt something strangely soft and yielding.
She lowered her lantern; there lay a man,
prone on his face, nearly covered by the fast-
falling flakes; he must have fallen from the
rock above, as not knowing of the circuitous
path, he had tried to descend its steep,
slippery face. Who could tell? it was no time
for thinking. Susan lifted him up with her
wiry strength; he gave no help—no sign of
life; but for all that he might be alive: he
was still warm; she tied her maud round
him; she fastened the lantern to her apron-
string; she held him tight: half-dragging,
half-carrying—what did a few bruises signify
to him, compared to dear life, to precious life!
She got him through the brake, and down the
path. There for an instant she stopped to
take breath; but as if stung by the Furies,
she pushed on again with almost superhuman
strength. Clasping him round the waist and
leaning his dead weight against the lintel of
the door, she tried to undo the latch; but
now, just at this moment, a trembling faintness
came over her, and a fearful dread took
possession of her—that here, on the very
threshold of her home, she might be found
dead, and buried under the snow, when the
farm-servants came in the morning. This
terror stirred her up to one more effort. She
and her companion were in the warmth of
the quiet haven of that kitchen; she laid
him on the settle, and sank on the floor
by his side. How long she remained in
swoon she could not tell; not very long she
judged by the fire, which was still red and
sullenly glowing when she came to herself.
She lighted the candle, and bent over her
late burden to ascertain if indeed he were
dead. She stood long gazing. The man lay
dead. There could be no doubt about it.
His filmy eyes glared at her, unshut. But
Susan was not one to be affrighted by the stony
aspect of death. It was not that; it was the
bitter, woeful recognition of Michael Hurst.

She was convinced he was dead; but after
a while she refused to believe in her conviction.
She stripped off his wet outer-garments
with trembling, hurried hands. She brought
a blanket down from her own bed; she
made up the fire. She swathed him up in
fresh, warm wrappings, and laid him on the
flags before the fire, sitting herself at his
head, and holding it in her lap, while she
tenderly wiped his loose, wet hair, curly still,
although its colour had changed from nut-
brown to iron-grey since she had seen it last.
From time to time she bent over the face
afresh, sick and fain to believe that the
flicker of the fire-light was some slight
convulsive motion. But the dim, staring eyes
struck chill to her heart. At last she ceased
her delicate busy cares, but she still held the
head softly, as if caressing it. She thought
over all the possibilities and chances in the
mingled yarn of their lives that might, by
so slight a turn, have ended far otherwise.
If her mother's cold had been early tended
so that the responsibility as to her brother's,
weal or woe had not fallen upon her; if the
fever had not taken such rough, cruel hold
on Will; nay, if Mrs. Gale, that hard,
worldly sister, had not accompanied him on
his last visit to Yew Nook,—his very last before
this fatal stormy night; if she had heard his
cry—cry uttered by those pale, dead lips
with such wild, despairing agony, not yet
three hours ago! O! if she had but heard
it sooner, he might have been saved before
that blind, false step had precipitated him
down the rock! In going over this weary
chain of unrealised possibilities Susan learnt
the force of Peggy's words. Life was short,
looking back upon it. It seemed but yesterday
since all the love of her being had been
poured out, and run to waste. The
intervening years—the long monotonous years that
had turned her into an old woman before her
time—were but a dream.

The labourers coming in the dawn of the
winter's day were surprised to see the
firelight through the low kitchen-window. They
knocked, and hearing a moaning answer, they
entered, fearing that something had befallen
their mistress. For all explanation they got
these words:

"It is Michael Hurst. He was belated, and
fell down the Raven's Crag. Where does
Eleanor, his wife, live?"

How Michael Hurst got to Yew Nook no
one but Susan ever knew. They thought he
had dragged himself there with some sore,
internal bruise sapping away his minuted life.
They could not have believed the superhuman
exertion which had first sought him
out, and then dragged him hither. Only
Susan knew of that.

She gave him into the charge of her
servants, and went out and saddled her horse.
Where the wind had drifted the snow on one
side, and the road was clear and bare, she
rode, and rode fast; where the soft, deceitful