It was long before we noticed the lapse of time; I not only told every
circumstance known to me of recent events among the households of Mrs.
Todd's neighborhood at the shore, but Mrs. Hight became more and more
communicative on her part, and went carefully into the genealogical
descent and personal experience of many acquaintances, until between us
we had pretty nearly circumnavigated the globe and reached Dunnet
Landing from an opposite direction to that in which we had started. It
was long before my own interest began to flag; there was a flavor of
the best sort in her definite and descriptive fashion of speech. It
may be only a fancy of my own that in the sound and value of many
words, with their lengthened vowels and doubled cadences, there is some
faint survival on the Maine coast of the sound of English speech of
Chaucer's time.
At last Mrs. Thankful Hight gave a suspicious look through the window.
"Where do you suppose they be?" she asked me. "Esther must ha' been
off to the far edge o' everything. I doubt William ain't been able to
find her; can't he hear their bells? His hearin' all right?"
William had heard some herons that morning which were beyond the reach
of my own ears, and almost beyond eyesight in the upper skies, and I
told her so. I was luckily preserved by some unconscious instinct from
saying that we had seen the shepherdess so near as we crossed the
field. Unless she had fled faster than Atalanta, William must have
been but a few minutes in reaching her immediate neighborhood. I now
discovered with a quick leap of amusement and delight in my heart that
I had fallen upon a serious chapter of romance. The old woman looked
suspiciously at me, and I made a dash to cover with a new piece of
information; but she listened with lofty indifference, and soon
interrupted my eager statements.
"Ain't William been gone some considerable time?" she demanded, and
then in a milder tone: "The time has re'lly flown; I do enjoy havin'
company. I set here alone a sight o' long days. Sheep is dreadful
fools; I expect they heard a strange step, and set right off through
bush an' brier, spite of all she could do. But William might have the
sense to return, 'stead o' searchin' about. I want to inquire of him
about his mother. What was you goin' to say? I guess you 'll have
time to relate it."
My powers of entertainment were on the ebb, but I doubled my diligence
and we went on for another half-hour at least with banners flying, but
still William did not reappear. Mrs. Hight frankly began to show
fatigue.
"Somethin' 's happened, an' he's stopped to help her," groaned the old
lady, in the middle of what I had found to tell her about a rumor of
disaffection with the minister of a town I merely knew by name in the
weekly newspaper to which Mrs. Todd subscribed. "You step to the door,
dear, an' look if you can't see 'em." I promptly stepped, and once
outside the house I looked anxiously in the direction which William had
taken.
To my astonishment I saw all the sheep so near that I wonder we had not
been aware in the house of every bleat and tinkle. And there, within a
stone's-throw, on the first long gray ledge that showed above the
juniper, were William and the shepherdess engaged in pleasant
conversation. At first I was provoked and then amused, and a thrill of
sympathy warmed my whole heart. They had seen me and risen as if by
magic; I had a sense of being the messenger of Fate. One could almost
hear their sighs of regret as I appeared; they must have passed a
lovely afternoon. I hurried into the house with the reassuring news
that they were not only in sight but perfectly safe, with all the sheep.