So he kissed her and they parted, and lay down and slept; she among her comrades under the apple-tree, and he under the briony in the hedge; and the moon came out of her dream and watched theirs.
With morning came a hoarse voice calling along the hedge:
"Maids! maids! maids!"
Up sprang the milkmaids, rubbing their eyes and stretching their arms; and up sprang Martin likewise. And seeing him, Joscelyn was stricken with dismay.
"It is Old Gillman, our master," she whispered, "come with bread and questions. Quick, singer, quick! into the hollow russet before he reaches the hole in the hedge."
Swiftly the milkmaids hustled Martin into the russet tree, and concealed him at the very moment when the Farmer was come to the peephole, filling it with his round red face and broad gray fringe of whiskers, like the winter sun on a sky that is going to snow.
"Good morrow, maids," quoth old Gillman.
"Good morrow, master," said they.
"Is my daughter come to her mind yet?"
"No, master," said little Joan, "but I begin to have hopes that she may."