"Thank God!" she said, when she had entirely lost sight of them. "Thank God, my darling is safe! I can bear anything that comes now. It is only what such as me have to look for. And Ermine said the good Lord wouldn't fail them that trusted Him. I'm only a poor ignorant old woman, and He knows it; but He took the pains to make me, and He'll not have forgot it; and Ermine says He died for me, and I'm sure He could never forget that, if He did it. I've done a many ill things, though I'm not the black witch they reckon me: no, I've had more laid to my charge than ever I did; but for all that I'm a sinner, I'm afeared, and I should be sore afeared to meet what's coming if He wouldn't take my side. But Ermine, she said He would, if I trusted myself to Him." Haldane clasped her withered hands and looked heavenwards. "Good Lord!" she said, "I'd fain have Thee on my side, and I do trust Thee. And if I'm doing it wrong way about, bethink Thee that I'm only a poor old woman, that never had no chance like, and I mean to do right, and do put things to rights for me, as Thou wouldst have 'em. Have a care of my darling, and see her safe: and see me through what's coming, if Thou wilt be so good. Worlds o' worlds, Amen." That conclusion was Haldane's misty idea of the proper way to end a prayer [Note 1]. Perhaps the poor petition found its way above the stars as readily as the choral services that were then being chanted in the perfumed cathedrals throughout England. She went in and shut the door. She did not, as usual, shake her straw bed and fold up the rug. A spectator might have thought that she had no heart for it. She only kept up the fire; for though summer was near, it was not over-warm in the crazy hut, and a cold east wind was blowing. For the whole of the long day she sat beside it, only now and then rising to look out of the window, and generally returning to her seat with a muttered exclamation of "Not yet!" The last time she did this, she pulled the faded woollen kerchief over her shoulders with a shiver. "Not yet! I reckon they'll wait till it's dusk. Well! all the better: they'll have more time to get safe away." The pronouns did not refer to the same persons, but Haldane made no attempt to specify them. She sat still after that, nodding at intervals, and she was almost asleep when the thing that she had feared came upon her. A low sound, like and yet unlike the noise of distant thunder, broke upon her ear. She sat up, wide awake in a moment. "They're coming! Good Lord, help me through! Don't let it be very bad to bear, and don't let it be long!" Ten minutes had not passed when the hut was surrounded by a crowd. An angry crowd, armed with sticks, pitchforks, or anything that could be turned into a weapon--an abusive crowd, from whose lips words of hate and scorn were pouring, mixed with profaner language. "Pull the witch out! Stone her! drown her! burn her!" echoed on all sides.