He surveyed the landscape around him with an anxious eye. It seemed as though by following the ridge of the hill upon which he stood, and crossing every obstacle that intervened, he ought to be able to do so—and to do so without losing sight of the two companions, as they unsuspiciously threaded their way over the flats.
Having made his resolution, he lost no time in putting it into action. He clambered without difficulty into the meadow on his right, and breaking, in his excitement, into a run, he forced his way through three successive bramble-hedges, and as many dew-drenched turnip-fields, without the least regard to the effect of this procedure upon his Sunday attire.
Every now and then, as the contours of the ground served, he caught a glimpse of the figures in the valley below, and the sight hastened the impetuosity of his speed. Once he felt sure he observed them pause and exchange an embrace, but this may have been an illusive mirage created by the mad fumes of the tempestuous jealousy which kept mounting higher and higher into his head. Recklessly and blindly he rushed on, performing feats of agility and endurance, such as in normal hours would have been utterly impossible.
From the moment he decided upon this desperate undertaking, to the moment, when, hot, breathless, and dishevelled, he reached his destination, only a brief quarter of an hour had elapsed.
He entered the barn leaving the door wide-open behind him. In its interior tightly packed bundles of dark-coloured hay rose up almost to the roof. The floor was littered with straw and newly-cut clover.
On one side of the barn, beneath the piled-up hay, was a large shelving heap of threshed oats. Here, obviously, was the sort of place, if the lovers paused at this spot at all, where they would be tempted to recline.
Directly opposite these oats, in the portion of the shed that was most in shadow, Clavering observed a narrow slit between the hay-bundles. He approached this aperture and tried to wedge himself into it. The protruding stalks of the hay pricked his hands and face, and the dust choked him.
With angry coughs and splutters, and with sundry savage expletives by no means suitable to a priest of the church, he at length succeeded in firmly imbedding himself in this impenetrable retreat. He worked himself so far into the shadow, that not the most cautious eye could have discerned his presence. His sole danger lay in the fact that the dust might very easily give him an irresistible fit of sneezing. With the cessation of his violent struggles, however, this danger seemed to diminish; for the dust subsided as quickly as it had been raised, and otherwise, as he leant luxuriously back upon his warm-scented support, his position was by no means uncomfortable.
Meanwhile Luke and Gladys were slowly and deliberately crossing the darkening water-meadows.
Gladys, whose geographical knowledge of the district was limited to the immediate vicinity of her home had not the remotest guess as to where she was being led. For all she knew Luke might have gone crazy, like his brother, and be now intending to plunge both himself and her into the depths of some lonely pool or weir. Nevertheless, she continued passively and meekly following him, walking, when the path along the dyke’s edge narrowed, at some few paces behind him, with that peculiar air of being a led animal, which one often observes in the partners of tramps, as they plod the roads in the wake of their masters.