My way lay straight into the heart of the setting sun as I took the road. In a clear sky, all pale yellow and pink and green, the sun was disappearing behind the line of beech-covered hills which lay between me and home, but behind me the moon—as yet only like a tiny round white cloud—was rising.
I felt like dancing along the road at first. The sense of freedom was intoxicating. The scent of wild honeysuckle and cluster roses came from the hedgerows. I ate my buns as I walked along; I had made three and a half miles by the milestones in the first hour, and enjoyed every step of the way.
"If they don't meet me," I thought, "how astonished they will be when I walk in! It will be something to brag of for many a day, to have walked fifteen miles after eight o'clock at night."
The daylight had faded, but the moon was so bright and clear that the shadows of my solitary figure and the "telegraph-postes" were as black and sharp as at noonday. Bats were flitting about up and down. A white owl flew silently across the road. Rabbits were playing in the fields in the silver light. It was all very beautiful, but a little lonely and eerie. I hadn't passed a house for a mile.
Then I heard wheels behind me.
If it were some kind person who would give me a lift!
But I heard a lash used cruelly, and a rough, hoarse voice swearing at the horse.
I hurried on, but of course the cart overtook me in a minute.
The man pulled up. He leaned down out of the cart to look at me, and I saw his coarse, flushed face and watery eyes.
"Want a lift, my dear?" he asked.