To-day was Friday.  He knew, from talk with the Cartwrights, that Jessie’s lessons were on alternate days, and as he had seen the two in the garden this morning, there would be no lesson on the morrow.  It was not easy to devise a plot for a private interview with Emily, yet he must see her tomorrow, and of course alone.  A few words with her would suffice.  To call upon her at the house would be only his last resource.  He felt assured that she had not spoken to her parents of the scene in the garden; several reasons supported this belief, especially the reflection that Emily would desire to spare her father the anxieties of a difficult position.  Taking this for granted, his relations with her must still be kept secret in order to avoid risking his impunity in the tactics he counted upon.  His hope was that she would leave the house alone in the course of the morning.

It has been mentioned that a railway bridge crossed the road a short distance beyond the Hoods’ house.  On the embankment beyond this bridge, twenty or thirty yards from the road, was a cluster of small trees and shrubs, railed in from the grass which elsewhere grew upon the slope, and from the field at its foot.  Here, just hidden behind a hawthorn bush and a climbing bramble, Dagworthy placed himself shortly before eight o’clock on Saturday morning, having approached the spot by a long circuit of trespass; from this position he had a complete view of the house he wished to watch.  He came thus early because he thought it possible that Emily accompanied her father on his morning’s walk into Dunfield; in which case he would follow at a distance, and find his opportunity as the girl returned.  There had been rain in the night, and his passage through the bushes covered him with moisture; the thick grass, too, in which he stood, was so wet that before long his feet grew damp and cold.  He was little mindful of bodily discomfort; never moving his eyes for a moment from the door which would give Emily to his view, he knew nothing but the impatience which made it incredible that his watch could keep pace with time; he seemed to have been waiting for hours when yet it was only half-past eight.  But at length the door opened.  He strained his sight across the distance, but with no reward.  Hood left the house alone, and walked off quickly in the direction of Dunfield.

He must wait.  It might happen that Emily would not quit home at all during the early part of the day, but he must wait on the chance.  He dreaded lest rain should fall, which would naturally keep her within doors, but by nine o’clock the sky had cleared, and he saw the leaves above him drying in the sunlight.  Inactivity was at all times intolerable to him to stand thus for hours was an exercise of impatient patience which only his relentless passion made possible; his body yielded to a sort of numbness, whilst the suffering expectancy of his mind only grew keener.  He durst not avert his eyes from the door for an instant; his sight ached and dazzled.  Still he waited.