Suddenly a shout rang across the hill and silenced her and the woodlarks. She saw against the full-blown flower of the west--black on scarlet--Reddin on his tall black horse, galloping towards her. Clouds were coming up for night. They raced with him. From one great round rift the light poured on Hazel as it does from a burning-glass held over a leaf. It burned steadily on her, and then was moved, as if by an invisible hand. Reddin came on, and the thunder of his horse's hoofs was in her ears. Hurtling thus over the pastures, breaking the year-long hush, he was the embodiment of the destructive principle, of cruelty, of the greater part of human society--voracious and carnivorous--with its curious callousness towards the nerves of the rest of the world. 'I a'most thought it was the death-pack,' said Hazel, speaking first, as the more nervous always does. She stood uncomfortably looking up at him as a rabbit looks, surprised half-way out of its burrow. 'Where be going?' she asked at last. 'Looking for you.' Hazel could not enjoy the flattery of this; she was so perturbed by his nearness. 'Where's your lord and master?' 'Ed'ard inna my master. None is.' A hot indignant flush surged over her. 'Yes,' said he; 'I am.' 'That you're not, and never will be.' Reddin said nothing. He sat looking down at her. In the large landscape his figure was carved on the sky, slenderly minute; yet it was instinct with forces enough to uproot a thousand trees and become, by virtue of these, the centre of the picture. He looked at his best on horse-back, where his hardness and roughness appeared as necessary qualities, and his too great share of virility was used up in courage and will-power. Hazel gazed defiantly back; but at last her eyelids flickered, and she turned away. 'I am,' Reddin repeated softly. He was as sure of her as he was of the rabbits and hares he caught in spring-traps when hunger drove them counter to instinct. A power was on Hazel now, driving her against the one instinct of her life hitherto--the wild creature's instinct for flight and self-preservation. She said nothing. Reddin was filled with a tumultuous triumph that Sally Haggard had never roused. 'I am,' he said again, and laughed as if he enjoyed the repetition. 'Come here!' Hazel came slowly, looked up, and burst into tears. 'Hello! Tears already?' he said, concerned. 'Keep 'em till there's something to cry for.' He dismounted and slipped the rein over his arm. 'What's up, Hazel Woodus?' He put one arm round her. The sheep looked more ancient than ever, less like old ladies at a concert than old ladies looking over their prayer-books at a blasphemer. 'My name inna Woodus. You'd ought to call me Mrs. Marston.' For answer, he kissed her so that she cried out. 'That's to show if I'll call you Mrs. Marston.' 'I'd liefer be.' 'What?' 'Ed'ard's missus than yourn.' He ground a foxglove underfoot.