"Come, come, Miley, are you asleep?" said Lister. Miles saw him kneeling on the rock close beside him, holding the boat's gunwale with one hand, and with the other outstretched. "Give me the bag. Now then, steady. Ah! You did yourself hurt?"
Miles picked himself up from the rock where he had fallen; his knees were aching, and he suddenly felt he should like to cry. "Yes, I hurt me," he said dazedly. "Give me Solomon."
He made his way, groping through the dark, to the path beneath the bluff that led up to the settlement. The ground had thawed, so broad puddles had formed; he must have splashed into one, for, as he stepped, his shoes squeaked with water. Ned Lister strode up alongside him, with Dolly gathered in his arms. "You come with me up to the Elder's house, Miley," he said breathlessly, for Ned was wiry, rather than robust, and Dolly was a heavy little maid.
All the way up the hill Miles had a sickening sense of awaking to something full of dread. The ground and the sky and the dimly seen houses were now all real; he felt the rain and the cold and the weight of the bag on his arm, and he began to realize that what had happened also was no dream.
"Oh!" he cried, with a sudden hard gasp, and, dropping the bag, broke into a run. He stumbled and slipped, but pantingly he held on till he reached the Brewsters' cottage. From one of the tiny windows a light shone forth, but it blinded without aiding him. He fumbled a moment at the heavy door, then, grasping the rude latch at last, thrust it open with his shoulder, and plunged headlong into the common room.
On the hearth, opposite the door, a fire blazed, and on the table flickered a candle. Spite of the dazzle of sudden light, Miles made out a woman, just turning from the fire, and, knowing her for the Elder's wife, ran to her. "Where's my mother, my mother?" he cried.
"Hush, hush, Miles! You must quiet yourself ere you see her," Mistress Brewster urged, never so gently.
But there came from an adjoining room his mother's voice: "Miles, I am here. Come to me."
The narrow chamber was dark, but, seated in the far corner, he could distinguish a woman's bowed figure, and, stumbling heavily across the floor, he flung himself on his knees beside her. "Mother! Oh, mother!" he choked, and, burying his face in her lap, burst out crying.