At length she heard something like a half-conquered yawn, and soon after the voices ceased.
Again a weary time, and once more she fell asleep.

She woke in the grey of the morning, and after yet two long hours, but of more hopeful waiting, she heard Caspar's welcome footsteps, and summoned all her strength to avoid breaking down on his entrance.

His first look of amazement she tried to answer with a smile, but at the expression of pitiful dismay which followed when another glance had revealed the cause of her presence, she burst into tears.

The honest man was full of compunctious distress at the sight of the suffering his breach of custom had so cruelly prolonged.
'And I haf bin slap in mine bed!' he exclaimed with horror at the contrast.
Had she been his daughter and his mistress both in one, he could not have treated her with greater respect or tenderness.

Of course he set about relieving her at once, but this was by no means such an easy matter as Dorothy had expected.