For I plumped myself down on the grass and cried like a child. It seemed to me that God's hand was indeed turned against my friend and his deliverance. But somehow into the midst of my lament there slipped a remembrance of Jack Larke. On the instant his face took shape and life before me, shining out as it were from a frame of darkness. I saw an honest scorn kindle in his eyes, and his lips shot "woman" at me. The visionary picture of him braced me like the cut of a whip. At all events, I thought, I would make a pretence of manhood, and I ceased from my blubbering, and laying hold of the horse by the bridle, led him forward over the Heath. I kept a sharp watch about me as I walked, but it must have been a full two hours afterwards when I caught a glimpse of a light far away on my left hand, glimmering in a little thicket upon a swell of the turf. At first I was minded to reckon it a star, for the Heath at that point was ridged up against the sky. But it shone with a beam too warm and homely to match the silver radiance of the planets. I turned joyfully in its direction, and quickening my pace, came at length to the back of a house. The light shone from a window on the ground floor facing me. I looked into it over a little paling, and saw that it was furnished as a kitchen. Plates and pewter-pots gleamed orderly upon the shelves, and a row of noble hams hung from the rafters. I hurried round the side of the house and found myself, to my great satisfaction, on a bank which overlooked the road. I scrambled down the side of it and knocked loudly at the door. It was opened by an elderly man, who stared at me in some surprise. "You travel late, young sir," said he, holding the door ajar. "I have need to," I replied. "I should have been in Bristol long ere this." "'Tis strange," he went on, eyeing me a thought suspiciously. "I caught no sound of your horse's hoofs upon the road." "'Twould have been stranger if you had," said I. "For I missed my way soon after sundown, and have been wandering since on the Heath. I saw the light of your house some half an hour agone over yonder," and I pointed in the direction whence I had come. "Then you are main lucky, sir," he returned, but in a more civil tone. "This is the 'Half-way House,' and it has no neighbours. In another hour we should have gone to bed--for we have no guests to-night--and you might have wandered until dawn." With that he set the door back against the wall, and stood aside for me to pass. "You must pardon my surliness," he said. "But few honest travellers cross Wickham Heath by dark, and at first I mistook you. I have never held truck with the gentry of the road, though, indeed, my pockets suffer for the ease of my conscience. However, if you will step within, my wife will get you supper while I lead your horse to the stables." "The beast is lame," said I, "and I would fain continue my way to-night. Have you a horse for hire?"