noon
So she thought of Richard , not of Richard 's Richard , but of some pale private Richard of her own . The approach of Richard upon a white horse for some time seemed only an extension of her dream . It was only when she realised that he was riding up her bean-row , and partially undoing the work of her hoe , that she awoke suddenly with a start , and caught and tore her breath upon a pin of pain . It seemed that the afternoon had now long possessed the fields , it had wakened into a live and electric blue the Enchanted Forest which she had last noticed shimmering in its noon green . All the workers at the approach of Richard were working busily , bent ostentatiously in the form of hairpins up and down their rows . The dragon was rippling anxiously along at the heels of the white horse ; a helpless hoping for the best expressed itself in every spike along his spine . `` I do n't really know why she 's idling like that , '' Sarah Brown heard him say in his breathy pathetic voice .