"Two miles further," she said. "What are you going there for, pray, if I may be so bold?"
"On an errand of life or death," Griselda said, the words escaping her lips almost unawares.
"If that's it, and a duel is to be fought, it most like is death to one of 'em. I am watching for my husband; he has never come home, and I fear something has happened. He is often in liquor, and may have stumbled into the quarry. I call _mine_ real troubles, I do. What do the gentry want with stabbing one another to the heart about paltry quarrels? Why, the French lord was killed out on Claverton Down by Count Rice a few months ago, and all about a trumpery pack of cards--a pack of lies, more like! I've no patience with folks who quarrel with no reason. You look very wan, my dear," the woman said, as Griselda turned away. "I can give you a cup of milk."
But Griselda shook her head. To eat or drink at that moment was impossible to her.
"Tell me," she asked, "how I shall know the spot where the men fight."
"Oh! you'll see four tall fir-trees, and a big stone. It won't be light yet. I'll tell you what. I'll lend you my lanthorn. Here, it's trimmed! You can carry it along." Griselda hesitated as the woman went on: "Take the road straight as a line from the church. Then you'll come to cross-roads. You follow on with the one which leads to the right hand, and you'll come to the firs and the big stone. The ground where the fine lord's body lay for hours is just hard by. Will you have the lanthorn; you can leave it as you come back?"
"No, I think not--I think not; but thank you kindly."
And then Griselda pressed on--on to the church, on, as she was directed, along a lonely road, till the tall sign-post was reached, with the four arms painted white, stretching out in four directions. On then to the right, eastward, for the first faint pallor of the dawn was in the sky. It was clear now, and the moon in its last quarter was hanging low in the horizon.
Griselda's feet ached, and when she saw the tall fir-trees, and the large rough stone, she hastened towards it, and sat down to rest. All was still; the silence broken only by the murmur in the dark plumes of the fir-trees as the crisp cold air wandered through the branches.