“That’s reets on’t,” answered the little man.

“Let me in with you?”

And Robbie climbed into the cart.

Mattha got up and went out in the road.

* * * * *

The two men had hardly got clear away when Rotha entered the cottage all but breathless.

“Robbie, where is he?”

“Gone, just gone, not above two minutes,” replied Liza, still whimpering.

“Where?”

“I scarce know—­to Penrith, I think.  There was no keeping him back.  When father came in and told him what had happened at Carlisle, he flung away and would not be hindered.  He has gone off in Reuben’s wagon.”

“Which way?”

“They took the low road.”

“Then I’ve missed them,” said Rotha, sinking into a chair in a listless attitude.

“And he’s as weak as water, and he’ll take another fever, as I told him, and ramble on same as—­”

“Liza,” interrupted Rotha, “did you ever tell him—­in play I mean—­did you ever repeat anything he had said when he was unconscious?”

“Not that about his mammy?”

“No, no; but anything else?”

“I mind I told him what he said over and over again about his fratch with that Garth.”

“Nothing else?”

“Why, yes, now I think on’t.  I mind, too, that I told him he was always running on it that something was fifty yards north of the bridge, and he could swear it, swear it in hea—­”

“What did he say to that?” asked Rotha eagerly.

“Say! he said nothing, but he glowered at me till I thought sure he was off again.”

“Is that all?”

“All what, Rotha?”

“They said in evidence that Ralph—­it was a lie, remember—­they said that Wilson was killed fifty yards to the north of the bridge.  Now his body was found as far to the south of it.  Robbie knows something.  I hoped to learn what he knows; but oh, everything is against me—­everything, everything.”

Rising hastily, she added, “Perhaps Robbie has gone to Carlisle.  I must be off, Liza.”

In another moment she was hurrying up the road.

* * * * *

Taking the high path, the girl came upon the Quaker preachers, surrounded by a knot of villagers.  To avoid them she turned up an unfrequented angle of the road.  There, in the recess of a gate, unseen by the worshippers, but commanding a view of them, and within hearing of all that was sung and said, stood Garth, the blacksmith.  He wore his leathern apron thrown over one shoulder.  This was the hour of mid-day rest.  He had not caught the sound of Rotha’s light footstep as she came up beside him.  He was leaning over the gate and listening intently.  There was more intelligence and also more tenderness in his face than Rotha had observed before.

She paused, and seemed prompted to a nearer approach, but for the moment she held back.  The worshippers began to sing a simple Quaker hymn.  It spoke of pardon and peace:—­