Then the light of determination returned to the young girl's face. Leaving Liza in the porch, she went into the house for her cloak and hood. When she rejoined her companion her mind was made up to a daring enterprise.
“The men of Wythburn, such of them as we can trust,” she said, “are in the funeral train. We must go ourselves; at least I must go.”
“Do let me go, too,” said Liza; “but where are you going?”
“To cross the fell to Stye Head.”
“We can't go there, Rotha—two girls.”
“What of that? But you need not go. It's eight miles across, and I may run most of the way. They've been gone nearly an hour; they are out of sight. I must make the short cut through the heather.”
The prospect of the inevitable excitement of the adventure, amounting, in Liza's mind, to a sensation equivalent to sport, prevailed over her dread of the difficulties and dangers of a perilous mountain journey, and she again begged to be permitted to go.
“Are you quite sure you wish it?” said Rotha, not without an underlying reluctance to accept of her companionship. “It's a rugged journey. We must walk under Glaramara.” She spoke as though she had the right of maturity of years to warn her friend against a hazardous project.
Liza protested that nothing would please her but to go. She accepted without a twinge the implication of superiority of will and physique which the young daleswoman arrogated. If social advantages had counted for anything, they must have been all in Liza's favor; but they were less than nothing in the person of this ruddy girl against the natural strength of the pale-faced young woman, the days of whose years scarcely numbered more than her own.
“We must set off at once,” said Rotha; “but first I must go to Fornside.”