He set her upon the ground at last, and dismounted beside her. It was some time before he could persuade her that she must go forward if she did not want to spend the night upon the hills. She was completely unnerved, and when she finally suffered him to put her in the saddle he led the horse on, walking at its head. She sat with her knee crooked on the saddle-tree, her white face drooping with fatigue; two great plaits of hair were falling to her waist. The appalling complications that life can weave round its victims had never been brought home to her so forcibly before: she was too tired and frightened even to think of the end of this crazy journey or of what would be its results; she was adrift and cut off from every one but the wild man who walked in front with his hand on the bridle. Her back ached and she was bewildered and cold. They plodded on till they had left the hill behind and were on the road. Two o'clock was striking from the tower of Talgwynne church as they entered the little town, and the sound rang over the empty street. Heber stopped at a door in a by-lane, and bidding Catherine remain on horseback, he flung a handful of small stones against an upper window. The casement was opened with some caution and a head was thrust out. Catherine started as she heard a woman speak. "It's me," said Heber; "let me in." Before he had ended his request the head was withdrawn, and in a few minutes the door opened like a yawning mouth in the whitewashed wall. The woman ran back for a light. Black Heber lifted Catherine from the saddle, and she followed him in. The striking of matches came from an adjacent room, and, when the light flared up, the girl found herself looking into a flagged kitchen from which emanated the faint warmth of a half-dead fire. The woman who had admitted them was bending over the lamp she was lighting, with its chimney, which she had taken off, in her hand; she replaced it, screwing up the wick, and turned to Heber. Her expression as she caught sight of the girl behind him was singular, and she neither came forward nor spoke a word, but stood looking at the shepherd, her reddish hair taking a redder glow from the lamp. The colour ran up to her face and remained in a bright spot on each of her high cheek-bones. Faint lines about her mouth and jaw showed that she had passed her freshest youth, though her full figure and unfaded eyes held all the attraction of womanhood in the mid-thirties. She had hurried on a few clothes, but her bodice was carelessly fastened and strained across her full bosom. When she turned her attention to Catherine she seemed to be looking down at her from a height. "Here's my girl, Catherine Dennis," said Heber shortly. "Ye'll not refuse her a bed to-night, Susannah." There was a tentative ring through his words which Catherine had not heard before. "There's no bed but mine," said the other. "She's dead tired," added Heber. "Where's father?"