"You've no call to be jealous nor anything else," said Tira steadily. "You an' me are as fur apart"—she hesitated for a word, and her eyes rested for a moment on one of the tall evergreens moving slightly in the breeze. "We couldn't any more come together than I could climb up to the pick o' that pine tree."
He still regarded her solicitously. He was determined not to abandon his part.
"Ain't somebody come betwixt us?" he demanded, with that vibration of the voice once so moving to her. "You can't deny it. Can you now?"
"Nobody's come betwixt us," said Tira. "If you was the only man on this earth to-day, I'd run from you as I would a snake. I hate you. No, I don't. I look on you as if you was the dirt under my feet."
But as she said it she glanced down, wistfully troubled, as if she begged forgiveness of the good earth. The quick anger she knew in him flared like a licking flame. He threw his arms about her and held her to him as tightly, it seemed to her, as if he were hostile to the very breath within her body. And she was still, not only because he gripped her so but because she had called upon that terrible endurance women recognize within themselves. He kissed her, angry, insulting kisses she could bear more patiently than the kisses of unwelcome love. But as his lips defiled her face, he was suddenly aware that it was wet. Great tears were rolling down her cheeks. He laughed.
"Cryin'?" he jeered. "Poor little cry-baby! wipe her eyes."
While he held her with one arm, the other hand plunged into her apron pocket and brought out her handkerchief. It also touched the key. His instincts, she knew, had a scope of devilish cunning, and at once he knew what key it was. He laughed. Looking off through the trees, he had seen what gave him another clue.
"Smoke!" he called, as if he shouted it to an unseen listener who might not have been clever enough to guess. "Smoke from that shack Raven lazes round in same as Old Crow did afore him. That's where you were goin'. The wood road all broke out for you. I might ha' known it when I see that. Go along, my lady. He'll be there waitin' for you. Go along. But jest for the fun o' the thing, you leave the key with me."
She answered with a desperate wrench; but though one of her hands reached the pocket where the key lay, she could only twitch the fingers, and while he laughed softly he pulled the tie of her apron and, releasing her with a little push, snatched the apron from her, rolled it and thrust it into his pocket. She sprang at him, but he gave her another push that sent her staggering and ran laughing to the sleigh.
"So long!" he called back at her.