An early cart from one of the neighbouring farms with vegetables for the market, lumbering along the road just as the day began to break, was the next thing that disturbed him. He fled from that too, wondering what the carter would think to see him standing there like a ghost in the dim dawn--and got over the wall into a field, to be out of the way, yet could not help feeling, as he listened, holding his breath, to the sound of the slow, jogging horses and the man’s heavy tread, that the carter must have spied him, and must be peeping over the wall and wondering who he could be. By this time Harry had got to feel very like a criminal. He felt sure that everybody would think he was a criminal and had done something desperate, to see him there in this guise. And how he was to get courage to go back to Wyburgh again in full daylight, in the sight of everybody, and knock at his uncle’s door, he did not know.
“Lord bless us! Master Harry!” the housekeeper cried. He came upon her suddenly as she opened the door to go out and feed her chickens, which was the first thing she did every morning. She was so scared that she let fall her apronful of seed, and held up her hands half to protect herself, for this worn, pale, wearied apparition, with coat-collar up to its ears, and hat drawn down over its brow, was like the ghost of Harry, not himself. “Lord bless us! Master Harry! it’s never _you_?”
“It is me, though: and dreadfully tired, and so cold I don’t know what to do with myself,” said Harry, with chattering teeth. “Let me come in and look at a fire.”
“Let you come in, my bonny boy! you shall come in, and welcome; and the kettle’s on, and I’ll soon make you some tea. Come into the kitchen, it’s the warmest place. Bless the lad! What hour did ye start at to get here so early? or has anything happened? You’ve not come for the doctor? I’m that surprised you might blow me over with a puff of your breath.”
“I shall not try,” said Harry, recovering himself a little as he felt the warmth of the fire. “There’s nothing wrong, Mrs. Eadie, they’re all well enough; but I want to see Uncle Henry, and I’m going back to Liverpool to-day.”
“Bless my heart! I thought you had come for a real holiday, and its no’ above a week; but whisht! laddie, dinna chatter with your teeth like that; come nearer to the fire. Dear, dear me, but you must be cold; not a great-coat upon your back, nor a comforter, nor one thing to keep the heat in ye. I hope you havena’ just gotten your death,” cried the housekeeper, pouring the steaming water, which it was good even to see, into her teapot; and in her anxiety to get him a comfortable meal she forgot to ask any more questions.