"Is he at home?"
"No; he left just before I came out."
"Is Fanny taken away?"
"Not yet. She will soon be—at nine o'clock."
"We won't go home at present, then. Suppose we walk about in this wood?"
Liddy, without exactly understanding everything, or anything, in this episode, assented, and they walked together further among the trees.
"But you had better come in, ma'am, and have something to eat. You will die of a chill!"
"I shall not come indoors yet—perhaps never."
"Shall I get you something to eat, and something else to put over your head besides that little shawl?"
"If you will, Liddy."
Liddy vanished, and at the end of twenty minutes returned with a cloak, hat, some slices of bread and butter, a tea-cup, and some hot tea in a little china jug.
"Is Fanny gone?" said Bathsheba.
"No," said her companion, pouring out the tea. Bathsheba wrapped herself up and ate and drank sparingly. Her voice was then a little clearer, and a trifling colour returned to her face. "Now we'll walk about again," she said.
They wandered about the wood for nearly two hours, Bathsheba replying in monosyllables to
