Until he now tried with all his might to see, he did not fully know how difficult seeing was.
The storm was not near enough to suggest danger, for there was still more than a minute between each flash and its peal.

As light rain drifted in his face, he braced himself to see by the next flash and remember what he saw; but when it came he only knew that it reflected light into the pools on the road in front of him, and revealed a black panorama of fence and tree, field and hill, that the next moment, was all so jumbled in his mind that he did not know where to avoid the very puddles he had seen so clearly, and splashed on through them, with no better knowledge of his way, and eyes too dazzled to see what otherwise they would have seen.

In this plight he did not hesitate, but turned and ran after the two he had met, to ask his way, thinking, as he did so, that he must have already passed the lane.
With some effort he caught them up.

They must have heard him coming, for their voices were silent as he approached.

He asked for the lane to Cooper's Farm, which he had been told was the name of the house at the foot of the mountain path.