"He is tired to death, poor man!" she muttered, her sympathy getting the better of her disappointment, and she crossed the meadow to intercept him.
Until he halted, in sheer weariness, to look around for some spot—a tree, or a bush—anything that would screen him from the glare of the sun, the man in the meadow did not see her; but the moment he spoke, Margaret knew that he was not one of her countrymen.
"Mistress, how far is it to the city?" he asked, in a foreign accent.
"That is it," she answered softly, and full of concern, for the stranger's limbs trembled, and his hand shook when he raised it to set his cap straight. With the other he gripped his staff tightly, lest he should fall.
"Yonder?" he exclaimed, gazing beneath his hand. "I did not see it in the blaze of the sunset. It seems a long way off."
"More than two miles," said Margaret.
"Two miles!" was the dismayed response; "so far as that?"
"Yes, sir. But how will you think to enter the city, since 'tis but a few minutes to sundown? They close the gates the moment the sunset bell has stopped."
"Is it so?" came the discouraged response. "I forgot that it is not here as it is in England, where our walled cities are so few. Then I must lie in the meadow till sunrise."
"You could enter if you had a pass," said Margaret, who was concerned for the stranger; for, in spite of his wallet and the travel stains, she saw that he was no common wanderer.