She was unconscious when he laid her down on the grass, but choked and moaned when he set to work to revive her, and realised that she was back in life and misery after he had succeeded in getting some whisky down her throat—­contents of the flask he always carried, as a preventive of chills and remedy for undue fatigues, and from which he had first helped himself.  They sat upon the ground side by side, his arm round her waist, her head—­feeling only that it was cushioned somewhere—­on his shoulder.  The night was so warm and windless that their wet clothes were little discomfort to them, but he kept grasping and wringing handfuls with the hand at liberty, while he supported her with the other.  The danger of damp “things” was more terrifying to him now than the danger of death had been a few minutes ago.

“There, there,” he said soothingly, “you feel better now—­don’t you?  Then I’ll just put on my coat, if you don’t mind.  I’ll wrap you up in the buggy rug—­and we’ll get back to Redford as soon as we can.  And in the morning, dear, you’ll wake up sorry for this—­this madness, and you’ll never do it again, will you?”

“Hysteria,” he said to himself.  “Her head turned by this love affair.  He’s treated her badly, whatever they may say, and it has unhinged her mind.”

This thought disposed him to be gentle with her when she positively refused to be taken back to Redford.

“Leave me here,” she implored him.  “I cannot go home!  I will not go home!  My father told me he wished I was dead.  Oh, I should have been dead now if you had left me alone, and then they would have been satisfied, and I should have been out of my misery, which is more than I can bear.  Oh, Mr Goldsworthy, don’t—­don’t!” “Mad as a hatter, poor thing,” he thought, as he desisted from his effort to raise her.  “Why, her father thinks the world of her!”

But something had to be done.  It was unwise to use force in these cases —­nor could he have brought himself to use it—­and of course he could not leave her at the dam, or leave her at all, while she was in her present mood, and without other protection; at the same time, it was imperatively necessary that he should get out of his wet clothes—­her also.  He mentioned this latter fact, and it was touching to see her own careful housewifely instincts assert themselves through all her mental agony.

“Oh, you are wet,” she mourned, feeling him—­it did not matter about herself; “oh, I am so sorry!  Do—­do go home at once, and take them off, and have something hot before you go to bed.”

“I will,” he said, “if you will go with me.”  A moment’s reflection showed him that this was the best course—­to take her to his own house, and send a message to Mr Pennycuick that she was there, and safe.

The thought of the town frightened her.  She dreaded to go anywhere out of the solitude of Nature in which she had tried to hide.  But he assured her of privacy and protection, and she was spent and beaten, and she gave in.  Like a child, she stood to be wrapped in the rug and lifted into the buggy, and they proceeded on their way to his home, where his old sister kept house for him and mothered his child, with the aid of one servant.