They stood loitering before the house, quietly enjoying
the view. The clock in the little inn struck eight, and it
sounded clear and sharp in the stillness.
"Can it be so late?" asked Ruth.
"I should not have thought it possible," answered Mr. Bellingham.
"But, never mind, you will be at home long before nine. Stay,
there is a shorter road, I know, through the fields; just wait a
moment, while I go in and ask the exact way." He dropped Ruth's
arm, and went into the public-house.
A gig had been slowly toiling up the sandy hill behind,
unperceived by the young couple, and now it reached the
tableland, and was close upon them as they separated. Ruth turned
round, when the sound of the horse's footsteps came distinctly as
he reached the level. She faced Mrs. Mason!
They were not ten--no, not five yards apart. At the same moment
they recognised each other, and, what was worse, Mrs. Mason had
clearly seen, with her sharp, needle-like eyes, the attitude in
which Ruth had stood with the young man who had just quitted her.
Ruth's hand had been lying in his arm, and fondly held there by
his other hand.
Mrs. Mason was careless about the circumstances of temptation
into which the girls entrusted to her as apprentices were thrown,
but severely intolerant if their conduct was in any degree
influenced by the force of these temptations. She called this
intolerance "keeping up the character of her establishment.
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