It was then that in dread and trembling she began to repent of the impetuous haste with which she had acted--then that she regretted her folly in not having prepared the way for her return by writing all she had to say to John; for of course, so she whispered sadly to herself, she was despised and utterly condemned. Public opinion, she could not doubt, was against her, for John was beloved and respected by all; while she--well, what, she asked herself, had _she_ done to deserve one single emotion of affection or esteem? Nothing--to her awakened conscience told her--absolutely nothing. She had held herself aloof from her neighbours with a pride which she now knew was both mean and wicked; and she had crowned all by bringing disgrace and sorrow on the man who, from his youth upwards, had lived as a friend amongst his neighbours, gaining by his good deeds, his honesty and kindliness, the hearts of all who knew and understood his worth. The short half-hour requisite to traverse the up-hill road that lay between Switcham and Pear-tree House sped away with cruel rapidity for Honor, who would gladly--to postpone the now dreaded moment of arrival--have deserted the lumbering “fly,” which that well-known old gray mare dragged on so wearily, and, resting by the wayside, have striven better to prepare herself for the coming trial. A cowardly wish it was, and senseless as it was cowardly, for what change, what power to endure, what gift of boldness, would time or thought bestow on one who for so many days and nights of solitary thought had been picturing to herself the meeting that was now so near at hand--the meeting which only the courage lent her by her newly-born hopes could, she now felt, enable her to support? As each well-remembered object, while drifting with terrible rapidity towards the home she had so recklessly abandoned, met her eyes, the nervous tremor which had begun, from the moment when she neared the Switcham station, to oppress her, became gradually more difficult of control. The hour, the season, the soft evening air, the bright green of the opening leaves, the thousand tokens of the blithesome spring, all these, instead of cheering and supporting Honor’s sinking spirits, lessened through the touching of some tender chord of memory, some link connected with the happy Past, her feeble powers of self-control. When the carriage from the Dragon drew up before the woodbine-covered porch, Honor’s agitation had arrived at its highest pitch, and when, at the sound of wheels upon the gravel, Hannah made her appearance at the door, and uttered, at the unexpected sight of the “young missus,” a half-suppressed exclamation of astonishment, there came no sound from Honor’s lips, while her feet, so incapable was she of movement, seemed glued to the time-worn sheepskin on which they rested.