Mary’s faculties all came back. Suppose the guess she had made was right, suppose it was _he_, with only herself in all the world to protect him! She disengaged herself from the bushes, and gliding from one shelter to another, sometimes dropping to the ground in her terror, lest he should be alarmed and fly from her, she followed. The night was soft and dim, wrapping all things in a ghostly shadow; but she never lost sight of the vague, moving thing winding out and in among the bushes, avoiding with a kind of strange skill the front of the house. He made a long round, and Mary kept up mechanically, always following, her limbs failing under her. When he had got round to the other side, he drew slowly near to the corresponding range of windows in the western wing; and after various falterings mounted the slope, and made his way along close to the house. The faltering, stealthy figure stealing along, now with a foot upon the ledge of stone, now all noiseless upon the turf, made her half shudder with terror, notwithstanding the excitement, which was all of which she was now sensible, the only thing that kept her up. Should anyone within catch a glimpse of the noiseless shadow thus stealing round the house, what wonder if panic and maddening terror should follow his steps! Mary, stumbling on, felt that she was going through all that was preliminary to that midnight visit which had half crazed her child. The gliding figure suddenly stopped. She saw it pause, turn inward, put up two arms to the window. Thank God, it was no longer Hetty’s window; the child was safe. And once more, once more--by what chance who could tell?--the opening gave way. With a last effort of strength pulling herself together, Mary climbed the slope.