because of the
enormous length of the route in proportion to that of the pedestrian's
path down the open hillside, and the consequent increase of labour for
the horse.

At this moment a footstep approached; but the light of the lamps being
in a different direction the comer was not visible. The step paused,
then came on again.

"Eustacia?" said Wildeve.

The person came forward, and the light fell upon the form of Clym,
glistening with wet, whom Wildeve immediately recognized; but Wildeve,
who stood behind the lamp, was not at once recognized by Yeobright.

He stopped as if in doubt whether this waiting vehicle could have
anything to do with the flight of his wife or not. The sight of
Yeobright at once banished Wildeve's sober feelings, who saw him again
as the deadly rival from whom Eustacia was to be kept at all hazards.
Hence Wildeve did not speak, in the hope that Clym would pass by without
particular inquiry.

While they both hung thus in hesitation a dull sound became audible
above the storm and wind. Its origin was unmistakable--it was the fall
of a body into the stream in the adjoining mead, apparently at a point
near the weir.

Both started. "Good God! can it be she?" said Clym.

"Why should it be she?" said Wildeve, in his alarm forgetting that he
had hitherto screened himself.

"Ah!--that's you, you traitor, is it?" cried Yeobright. "Why should it
be she? Because last week she would have put an end to her life if she
had been able. She ought to have been watched! Take one of the lamps and
come with me."

Yeobright seized the one on his side and hastened on; Wildeve did not
wait to unfasten the other, but followed at once along the meadow track
to the weir, a little in the rear of Clym.

Shadwater Weir had at its foot a large circular pool, fifty feet in
diameter, into which the water flowed through ten huge hatches, raised
and lowered by a winch and cogs in the ordinary manner. The sides of the
pool were of masonry, to prevent the water from washing away the bank;
but the force of the stream in winter was sometimes such as to undermine
the retaining wall and precipitate it into the hole. Clym reached the
hatches, the framework of which was shaken to its foundations by the
velocity of the current. Nothing but the froth of the waves could be
discerned in the pool below. He got upon the plank bridge over the race,
and holding to the rail, that the wind might not blow him off, crossed
to the other