said the old woman, looking up at this tall stranger with a wonder that made her slower of speech than usual. “Will you please to come in?” she added, retiring from the door, as if recollecting herself. “Why, ye’re brother to the young man as come afore, arena ye?”
“Yes,” said Adam, entering. “That was Seth Bede. I’m his brother Adam. He told me to give his respects to you and your good master.”
“Aye, the same t’ him. He was a gracious young man. An’ ye feature him, on’y ye’re darker. Sit ye down i’ th’ arm-chair. My man isna come home from meeting.”
Adam sat down patiently, not liking to hurry the shaking old woman with questions, but looking eagerly towards the narrow twisting stairs in one corner, for he thought it was possible Hetty might have heard his voice and would come down them.
“So you’re come to see Dinah Morris?” said the old woman, standing opposite to him. “An’ you didn’ know she was away from home, then?”
“No,” said Adam, “but I thought it likely she might be away, seeing as it’s Sunday. But the other young woman—is she at home, or gone along with Dinah?”
The old woman looked at Adam with a bewildered air.
“Gone along wi’ her?” she said. “Eh, Dinah’s gone to Leeds, a big town ye may ha’ heared on, where there’s a many o’ the Lord’s people. She’s been gone sin’ Friday was a fortnight: they sent her the money for her journey. You may see her room here,” she went on, opening a door and not noticing the effect of her words on Adam. He rose and followed her, and darted an eager glance into the little room with its narrow bed, the portrait of Wesley on the wall, and the few books lying on the large Bible. He had had an irrational hope that Hetty might be there. He could not speak in the first moment after seeing that the room was empty; an undefined fear had seized him—something had happened to Hetty on the journey. Still the old woman was so slow of; speech and apprehension, that Hetty might be at Snowfield after all.
“It’s a pity ye didna know,” she said. “Have ye come from your own country o’ purpose to see her?”
“But Hetty—Hetty Sorrel,” said Adam, abruptly; “Where is she?”
“I know nobody by that name,” said the old woman, wonderingly. “Is it anybody ye’ve heared on at Snowfield?”
“Did there come no young woman here—very young and pretty—Friday was a fortnight, to see Dinah Morris?”
“Nay; I’n seen no young woman.”
“Think; are you quite sure? A girl, eighteen years old, with dark eyes and dark curly hair, and a red cloak on, and a basket on her arm? You couldn’t forget her if you saw her.”
“Nay; Friday was a fortnight—it was the day as Dinah went away—there come nobody. There’s ne’er been nobody asking for her till you come, for the folks about know as she’s gone. Eh dear, eh dear, is there summat the matter?”
The old woman had seen the ghastly look of fear in Adam’s face. But he was not stunned or confounded: he was thinking eagerly where he could inquire about Hetty.
“Yes; a young woman started from our country to see Dinah, Friday was a fortnight. I came to fetch her back. I’m afraid something has happened to her. I can’t stop. Good-bye.”
He hastened out of the cottage, and the old woman followed him to the gate, watching him sadly with her shaking head as he almost ran towards the town. He was going to inquire at the place where the Oakbourne coach stopped.
No! No young woman like Hetty had been seen there. Had any accident happened to the coach a fortnight ago? No. And there was no coach to take him back to Oakbourne that day. Well, he would walk: he couldn’t stay here, in wretched inaction. But the innkeeper, seeing that Adam was in great anxiety, and entering into this new incident with the eagerness of a man who passes a great deal of time with his hands in his pockets looking into an obstinately monotonous street, offered to take him back to Oakbourne in his own “taxed cart” this very evening. It was not five o’clock; there was plenty of time for Adam to take a meal and yet to get to Oakbourne before ten o’clock. The innkeeper declared that he really wanted to go to Oakbourne, and might as well go to-night; he should have all Monday before him then. Adam, after making an ineffectual attempt to eat, put the food in his pocket, and, drinking a draught of ale, declared himself ready to set off. As they approached the cottage, it occurred to him that he would do well to learn from the old woman where Dinah was to be found in Leeds: if there was trouble at the Hall Farm—he only half-admitted the foreboding that there would be—the Poysers might like to send for Dinah. But Dinah had not left any address, and the old woman, whose memory for names was infirm, could not recall the name of the “blessed woman” who was Dinah’s chief friend in the Society at Leeds.
During that long, long journey in the taxed cart, there was time for all the conjectures of importunate fear and struggling hope. In the very first shock of discovering that Hetty had not been to Snowfield, the thought of Arthur had darted through Adam like a sharp pang, but he tried for some time to ward off its return by busying himself with modes of accounting for the alarming fact, quite apart from that intolerable thought. Some accident had happened. Hetty had, by some strange chance, got into a wrong vehicle from Oakbourne: she had been taken ill, and did not want to frighten them by letting them know. But this frail fence of vague improbabilities was soon hurled down by a rush of distinct agonizing fears. Hetty had been deceiving herself in thinking that she could love and marry him: she had been loving Arthur all the while; and now, in her desperation at the nearness of their marriage, she had run away. And she was gone to him. The old indignation and jealousy rose again, and prompted the suspicion that Arthur had been dealing falsely—had written to Hetty—had tempted her to come to him—being unwilling, after all, that she should belong to another man besides himself. Perhaps the whole thing had been contrived by him, and he had given her directions how to follow him to Ireland—for Adam knew that Arthur had been gone thither three weeks ago, having recently learnt it at the Chase. Every sad look of Hetty’s, since she had been engaged to Adam, returned upon him now with all the exaggeration of painful retrospect. He had been foolishly sanguine and confident. The poor thing hadn’t perhaps known her own mind for a long while; had thought that she could forget Arthur; had been momentarily drawn towards the man who offered her a protecting, faithful love. He couldn’t bear to blame her: she never meant to cause him this dreadful pain. The blame lay with that man who had selfishly played with her heart—had perhaps even deliberately lured her away.
At Oakbourne, the ostler at the Royal Oak remembered such a young woman as Adam described getting out of the Treddleston coach more than a fortnight ago—wasn’t likely to forget such a pretty lass as that in a hurry—was sure she had not gone on by the Buxton coach that went through Snowfield, but had lost sight of her while he went away with the horses and had never set eyes on her again. Adam then went straight to the house from which the Stonition coach started: Stoniton was the most obvious place for Hetty to go to first, whatever might be her destination, for she would hardly venture on any but the chief coach-roads. She had been noticed here too, and was remembered to have sat on the box by the coachman; but the coachman could not be seen, for another man had been driving on that road in his stead the last three or four days. He could probably be seen at Stoniton, through inquiry at the inn where the coach put up. So the anxious heart-stricken Adam must of necessity wait and try to rest till morning—nay, till eleven o’clock, when the coach started.
At Stoniton another delay occurred, for the old coachman who had driven Hetty would not be in the town again till night. When he did come he remembered Hetty well, and remembered his own joke addressed to her, quoting it many times to Adam, and observing with equal frequency that he thought there was something more than common, because Hetty had not laughed when he joked her. But he declared, as the people had done at the inn, that he had lost sight of Hetty directly she got down. Part of the next morning was consumed in inquiries at every house in the town from which a coach started—(all in vain, for you know Hetty did not start from Stonition by coach, but on foot in the grey morning)—and then in