Faces looked out of windows and were gone, like scraps of a
dream. But just beyond the village we passed an old labourer trudging
to his work, and he jumped into the hedge and grinned as we went by.
We were climbing the moor now, at a lopping gallop that set the packet
of dolls bob-bobbing on my back to a sort of tune. The horses behind
were nearly spent, and the sweat had worked their soaped hides into a
complete lather. But the mare generalled them all the while; and
striking on a cart-track beyond the second rise of the moor, slowed down
to a walk, wheeled round and scanned the troop. As they struggled up
she whinnied loudly. A whistle answered her far down the lane, and at
the sound of it she was off again like a bird.
The track led down into a hollow, some acres broad, like a saucer
scooped between two slopes of the moor; and in the middle of it--just
low enough to be hidden from the valley beneath--stood a whitewashed
farmhouse, with a courtlege in front and green-painted gate; and by this
gate three persons watched us as we came--a man and two women.
The man by his dress was plainly a farmer; and catching sight of me, he
called out something I could not understand, and turned towards the
woman beside him, whom I took to be his wife. But the other woman, who
stood some paces away, was a very different person--tall and slight,
like a lady; grey-haired, and yet not seeming old; with long white hands
and tiny high-heeled shoes, and dressed in black silk, with a lace shawl
crossed over her shoulders, and a silver whistle hanging from her neck.
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