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Updated: May 21, 2025
Willy looked after him, and marked that he took the road to Fornside. When he got there he found the little cottage besieged. Crowds of women and boys stood round the porch and peered in at the window. Ralph pushed his way through them and into the house. In the kitchen were the men from Gaskarth and many more.
"That's many and many a year agone; leastways, so it seems. My wife was living then. We were married in Gaskarth, but work was bad, and we packed up and went to live for a while in a great city, leagues and leagues to the south. And there my poor girl, Josephine I called her Josie for short, and because it was more kind and close like there my poor girl fell ill and died.
Branthwaite was sitting at Robbie's bedside bathing his hot forehead with cloths damped in vinegar. The little woman timid and nervous in quieter times was beginning to show some mettle now. "Robbie has the fever, the brain fever," she said. She was right. The old wife's diagnosis was as swift as thought. Next day they sent for the doctor from Gaskarth.
"Does he come from beyond Gaskarth?" she asked. "Why, why?" "This commotion ill befits the gravity of a trial of such grave concernment," said one of the judges in an austere tone. In another moment the woman and her eager interlocutor had left the court together. There was then a brief consultation between the occupants of the bench.
He had little doubt which path to take when he reached the angle of the roads at the corner of the churchyard. If Ralph had taken the road leading to Gaskarth he might be safe, but if he had taken the road leading to Carlisle he must be in danger. Therefore Robbie determined to follow the latter.
He would set out early and return late, usually walking in the direction of Gaskarth. One day Wilson rose at daybreak, and putting a threshing-flail over his shoulder, said he would be away for a week. That week ensuing was a quiet one for the inmates of the cottage at Fornside.
It was very dark. Suddenly the awful thought came back upon me, it did. I was standing at the crossways, where the road goes off to Gaskarth. I knew Wilson must come by that road. Something commanded me to walk on. I had been halting, but now a dreadful force compelled me to go ay, compelled me. I don't know what it was, but it seemed as if I'd no power against it, none.
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