"
"If no daughter of Judah," replied Tamar, "wears heavier manacles than I
do, dear father, they may bear them with light hearts;" and, as she
passed quickly by her adopted father, she snatched his hand and kissed
it, and soon she disappeared beyond the boundary of the glen.
Tamar reached the village in so short a time, and did her errands so
quickly, that having some hours of light before her, she thought she
would try another way of return, over a small bridge, which in fact
spanned the very water-course which ran through her glen; but being
arrived at this bridge, to her surprise she found it broken down. It
was only a single plank, and the wood had rotted and given way. The
brook was too wide and deep in that place to permit her to cross it, and
the consequence was, that she must needs go round more than a mile; and,
what added to her embarrassment, the evening, which had been fine, was
beginning to cloud over, the darkness of the sky hastening the approach
of the dusk. She had now farther to walk than she had when in the
village; and, added to the threatenings of the clouds, there were
frequent flashings of pale lightning, and remote murmurings of thunder.
But Tamar was not easily alarmed; she had been brought up independently,
and already had she recovered the direct path from the village to
Shanty's shed, when suddenly a tall figure of a female arose, as it
were, out of the broom and gorse, and stepped in the direction in which
she was going, walking by her side for a few paces without speaking
a word.
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