Had she been wise and strong enough to look at it, she would have known that below her love for this man was the apprehension that his beauty of face and form held a shallow soul; that his sincerity was a thin sheet of gilt over a hollow heart; that he was but a slender reed, which would break if too heavy a weight were put upon it. But she loved, she worshipped, she refused to see her idol's feet of clay. And the result became that which she was trying to escape--a tormented mind. The forest lay silent. She could still hear the bleating of sheep on the fells, and the crying of the pee-weeps. But under the dark blue shadow of the trees nothing moved save a sheaf of flag leaves growing in a ditch beside the road. After a little while Jake, the rat-catcher, came along, leading Peter's big brown bear, which he had taken out for exercise. The thin little man and the ungainly beast passed up the path to the house on the crag, then the curtain of silence fell again, only lifted for a moment by the return of Jake alone. He did not see Lucy, and went home through the forest playing upon his flute. She wondered what time it was! She began to feel cold and thought that she would not have the courage to stay there all night. Besides Barbara, or the hind, or Jan Straw would soon come to look for her, and they would come first to Forest Hall. She got to her feet meaning to go home. Then a window was thrown open far over her head, and the loud laughing of men went jarring above the tree-tops. Some of Joel's friends, from the country around, had ridden over to see him off and wish him god-speed. He was making merry, while she was eating her own heart with hunger. She wavered, took a step forward, then a step back, hesitated, but, in the end, impelled by a stronger power than her own, she crept up to the house, and looked in at a window. The room was lit with many candles, burning with long red tongues, and much smoke. They shone upon pewter mugs, rough heads, and jocular faces. Not a man among the lot could match Joel in bearing or grace of countenance. He stood in the middle of them, with a tankard held high, for he had just called a toast. She had not been in time to hear what he had said, but she saw the smile run from lip to lip, and heard again the loud laughing. She sank down on the grass under the window. So this was all that Joel cared! She felt that he had torn out her heart, and flung it still fluttering in her face. He could amuse himself with his companions, finding a time for mirth upon his last night in Forest Hall; he could blot her out of his thoughts with jests and singing. As a matter of fact Joel was thinking of her, and the toast which he had called was to 'the lass of his heart.' It was not his nature to be stiff, when others were genial, or pull a long face in the faces of his friends.