. Shrewsbury; a romance . ; and more than my share of the agitation of spiritnatural in one who knows (and is new to the thought)that under cover of the darkness a woman stands tremb-ling and waiting for him. A few paces from the house—which I could leave without difficulty, though at the riskof detection—I glanced back to assure myself that allwas still: then shivering, as much with excitement as atthe chill greeting the night air gave me, I hastened to thegap in the fence, through which I had before seen mymistress. I felt for the gap Avitli my hand and peered through it,and called her name
. Shrewsbury; a romance . ; and more than my share of the agitation of spiritnatural in one who knows (and is new to the thought)that under cover of the darkness a woman stands tremb-ling and waiting for him. A few paces from the house—which I could leave without difficulty, though at the riskof detection—I glanced back to assure myself that allwas still: then shivering, as much with excitement as atthe chill greeting the night air gave me, I hastened to thegap in the fence, through which I had before seen mymistress. I felt for the gap Avitli my hand and peered through it,and called her name softly—Jennie! Jennie! andlistened; and after an interval called again, more hearing nothing, I discovered by the sinking at myheart —which was such that, for all my eighteen years, Icould have sat down and cried—how much I had built onher coming. And I called again and again; and still gotno answer. Yet I did not despair. Mrs. D might have kept her, or one of a hundred things might have happened to. IN AN INSTANT I WAS ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FENCE SB:Fti:WSBriiY 23 delay her; from one cause or another she might not havebeen able to slip out as quickly as she had thought. Shemight come yet; and so, though the more prolonged myabsence, the greater risk of detection I ran, I composedmyself to wait with what patience I might. The townwas quiet; human noise at an end for the day; but Mr. D s school stood on the outskirts, with its back to the open country, and between the sighing of the windamong the poplars, and the murmur of a neighbouringbrook, and those far-off noises that seem inseparable fromthe night, I had stood a minute or more before anothersound, differing from all these, and having its origin at aspot much nearer to me, caught my ear, and set my heartbeating. It was the noise of a woman weeping; and tothis day I do not know precisely what I did on hearing it—when I made out what it was, I mean—or how I foundcourage to do it; onlv, that in an
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