The patrol will be here directly.

Be quick, Master Ridd, let me hide thee.' 'I will not stir a step,' said I, though being in the greatest fright that might be well imagined,' unless you call me "John."' 'Well, John, then--Master John Ridd, be quick, if you have any to care for you.' 'I have many that care for me,' I said, just to let her know; 'and I will follow you, Mistress Lorna, albeit without any hurry, unless there be peril to more than me.' Without another word she led me, though with many timid glances towards the upper valley, to, and into, her little bower, where the inlet through the rock was.

I am almost sure that I spoke before (though I cannot now go seek for it, and my memory is but a worn-out tub) of a certain deep and perilous pit, in which I was like to drown myself through hurry and fright of boyhood.

And even then I wondered greatly, and was vexed with Lorna for sending me in that heedless manner into such an entrance.

But now it was clear that she had been right and the fault mine own entirely; for the entrance to the pit was only to be found by seeking it.