Reckoning that Mr. Godwin (as I must henceforth call him) had been set out two hours or thereabouts, I considered that we might overtake him in about three at an easy amble. But Moll was in no mood for ambling, and no sooner were we started than she put her nag to a gallop and kept up this reckless pace up hill and down dale,--I trailing behind and expecting every minute to be cast and get my neck broke,--until her horse was spent and would answer no more to the whip. Then I begged her for mercy's sake to take the hill we were coming to at a walk, and break her fast. "For," says I, "another such half-hour as the last on an empty stomach will do my business, and you will have another dead man to bring back to life, which will advance your journey nothing, and so more haste, less speed." Therewith I opened my saddle bag, and sharing its contents, we ate a rare good meal and very merry, and indeed it was a pleasure now to look at her as great as the pain had been to see her so unhappy a few hours before. For the exercise had brought a flood of rich colour into her face, and a lively hope sparkled in her eyes, and the sound of her voice was like any peal of marriage bells for gaiety. Yet now and then her tongue would falter, and she would strain a wistful glance along the road before us as fearing she did hope too much. However, coming to an inn, we made enquiry, and learnt that a man such as we described had surely passed the house barely an hour gone, and one adding that he carried a basket on his stick, we felt this must be our painter for certain.
Thence on again at another tear (as if we were flying from our reckoning) until, turning a bend of the road at the foot of a hill, she suddenly drew rein with a shrill cry. And coming up, I perceived close by our side Mr. Godwin, seated upon the bridge that crossed a stream, with his wallet beside him.
He sprang to his feet and caught in an instant the rein that had fallen from Moll's hand, for the commotion in her heart at seeing him so suddenly had stopped the current of her veins, and she was deadly pale.
"Take me, take me!" cries she, stretching forth her arms, with a faint voice. "Take me, or I must fall," and slipping from her saddle she sank into his open, ready arms.
"Help!" says Mr. Godwin, quickly, and in terror.
"Nay," says she; "I am better--'tis nothing. But," adds she, smiling at him, "you may hold me yet a little longer."
The fervid look in his eyes, as he gazed down at her sweet pale face, seemed to say: "Would I could hold you here for ever, sweetheart."
"Rest her here," says I, pointing to the little wall of the bridge, and he, complying (not too willingly), withdrew his arm from her waist, with a sigh.
And now the colour coming back to her cheek, Moll turns to him, and says:
"I thought you would have come again. And since one of us must ask to be forgiven, lo! here am I come to ask your pardon." "Why, what is there to pardon, Madam?" says he.