She hailed my approach, not with joy, but with grief.

She was weeping under great distress of mind, but it was hard for me to extort from her the reason why she wept.

She finally informed me that her master had found out that I had violated his law, and I should suffer the penalty, which was five hundred lashes, on my naked back.
I asked her how he knew that I had gone?
She said I had not long been gone before he called for me and I was not to be found.

He then sent the overseer on horseback to the place where we were to meet to see if I was there.

But when the overseer got to the place, the meeting was over and I had gone back home, but had gone a nearer route through the woods and the overseer happened not to meet me.