his idea came upon me
like a flash of lightning on a dark night, making all things so clear
we cannot forget them afterwards when the gloomy obscurity returns. I
was still standing with the book in my hand when I heard cousin
Holman's footsteps on the stairs, and as I did not wish to speak to her
just then, I followed Phillis's example, and rushed out of the house.
The snow was lying on the ground; I could track her feet by the marks
they had made; I could see where Rover had joined her. I followed on
till I came to a great stack of wood in the orchard--it was built up
against the back wall of the outbuildings,--and I recollected then how
Phillis had told me, that first day when we strolled about together,
that underneath this stack had been her hermitage, her sanctuary, when
she was a child; how she used to bring her book to study there, or her
work, when she was not wanted in the house; and she had now evidently
gone back to this quiet retreat of her childhood, forgetful of the clue
given me by her footmarks on the new-fallen snow. The stack was built
up very high; but through the interstices of the sticks I could see her
figure, although I did not all at once perceive how I could get to her.
She was sitting on a log of wood, Rover by her. She had laid her cheek
on Rover's head, and had her arm round his neck, partly for a pillow,
partly from an instinctive craving for warmth on that bitter cold day.
She was making a low moan, like an animal in pain, or perhaps more like
the sobbing of the wind. Rover, highly flattered by her caress, and
also, perhaps, touched by sympathy, was flapping his heavy tail against
the ground, but not otherwise moving a hair, until he heard my approach
with his quick erected ears. Then, with a short, abrupt bark of
distrust, he sprang up as if to leave his mistress. Both he and I were
immovably still for a moment. I was not sure if what I longed to do was
wise: and yet I could not bear to see the sweet serenity of my dear
cousin's life so disturbed by a suffering which I thought I could
assuage. But Rover's ears were sharper than my breathing was noiseless:
he heard me, and sprang out from under Phillis's restraining hand.

'Oh, Rover, don't you leave me, too,' she plained out.

'Phillis!' said I, seeing by Rover's exit that the entrance to where
she sate was to be found on the other side of the stack. 'Phillis, come
out! You have got a cold already; and it is not fit for you to sit
there o