Jane

Jane appears when Todd Hewitt, feverish and grieving over Viola’s disappearance, is being carried on the back of Wilf’s heavily loaded cart. Her brief encounter turns a moment of apparent defeat into one of practical care and urgent information: she treats Todd, tells him that an advancing army is gathering strength, and cautions him that the woods ahead are dangerous.

Encounter and Appearance

Jane steps down from the seat of Wilf’s cart to face Todd. The cart is crowded with leather-covered parcels and boxes, furniture, and large baskets, giving the travelers’ arrival a hurried, makeshift quality. Jane is broad, dressed in a worn dress, and has flyaway hair and lines at the corners of her eyes. Her voice is quick, while her manner is direct and inquisitive.

Todd tells her that Viola is gone and that he has lost her. Jane responds first by placing a cool hand on his forehead; when she recognizes that he has a fever, she tells Wilf. The exchange places her practical attention beside Todd’s distress: she does not dismiss his loss, but addresses the immediate danger to his health.

Care and News of the Army

Jane returns with a foul-smelling rag made from roots, mud, and herbs, and ties it around Todd’s forehead over the bandage already on the side of his head. She says the treatment should help his fever, then climbs back onto the cart as Wilf sets the oxen moving. Her care is improvised, but it is concrete: she offers treatment while Todd is too exhausted to resist or do much for himself.

As they travel, Jane asks whether Todd is also running from the army. She reports rumors spreading up the river and road: Brockley Falls, Bar Vista, and other places have heard that an army is coming, growing as it goes, with men taking up arms to join it. The force is said to number thousands. Her report gives Todd a measure of the threat beyond his immediate pursuit and makes clear that the danger is expanding rather than staying in one place.

Warning and Narrative Role

Todd thanks Jane for the food and poultry but says he has to leave. Jane urges him not to go into the woods, describing them as dangerous. When he asks what she means, the warning opens an unresolved question about the risks ahead; the evidence of their encounter does not yet explain what makes the woods dangerous.

Jane’s role in this passage is brief but consequential. She offers bodily care and supplies, conveys the scale of the approaching army through rumor, and tries to keep an injured, feverish traveler from making a dangerous choice. Her quiet presence also reminds Todd of Viola, sharpening the emotional contrast between the person he has lost sight of and the stranger who is helping him now.