Watching these neighbors, who knew neither law nor sin, distracted her a little from her trouble; and she managed to while away some portion of the afternoon by putting Giles's home in order and making little improvements which she deemed that he would value when she was gone.
Once or twice she fancied that she heard a faint noise amid the trees, resembling a cough; but as it never came any nearer she concluded that it was a squirrel or a bird.
At last the daylight lessened, and she made up a larger fire for the evenings were chilly.

As soon as it was too dark--which was comparatively early--to discern the human countenance in this place of shadows, there came to the window to her great delight, a tapping which she knew from its method to be Giles's.
She opened the casement instantly, and put out her hand to him, though she could only just perceive his outline.

He clasped her fingers, and she noticed the heat of his palm and its shakiness.
"He has been walking fast, in order to get here quickly," she thought.
How could she know that he had just crawled out from the straw of the shelter hard by; and that the heat of his hand was feverishness?
"My dear, good Giles!" she burst out, impulsively.
"Anybody would have done it for you," replied Winterborne, with as much matter-of-fact as he could summon.
"About my getting to Exbury ?" she said.
"I have been thinking," responded Giles, with tender deference, "that you had better stay where you are for the present, if you wish not to be caught.

I need not tell you that the place is yours as long as you like; and perhaps in a day or two, finding you absent, he will go away.
At any rate, in two or three days I could do anything to assist--such as make inquiries, or go a great way towards Sherton-Abbas with you; for the cider season will soon be coming on, and I want to run down to the Vale to see how the crops are, and I shall go by the Sherton road.
But for a day or two I am busy here." He was hoping that by the time mentioned he would be strong enough to engage himself actively on her behalf.

"I hope you do not feel over-much melancholy in being a prisoner ?" She declared that she did not mind it; but she sighed.
From long acquaintance they could read each other's heart-symptoms like books of large type.