midnight
A dreaming fancy that this was death vaguely came on him , and he was glad it should be so . His eyelids closed unconsciously , weighed down as by the weight of lead ; he saw the starry skies above him no more , and the distant noise of the pursuit waxed duller and duller on his ear ; then he lost all sense and memory -- he ceased even to feel the night air on his face . How long he lay there he never knew ; when consciousness returned to him all was still ; the moon was shining down clear as the day , the west wind was blowing softly among his hair . He staggered to his feet and leaned against the timber of the upper wall ; the shelving , impenetrable darkness sloped below ; above were the glories of a summer sky at midnight , around him the hills and woods were bathed in the silver light ; he looked , and he remembered all . He had escaped his captors ; but for how long ? While yet there were some hours of the night left , he must find some surer refuge , or fall into their hands again . Yet it was strange that in this moment his own misery and his own peril were less upon him than a longing to see once more -- and for the last time -- the woman for whose sake he suffered this .