“Redwood! That great powerful bully!” cried Miss Kennett.
“Yes’m. And Squire looked that frit, it might ha’ been a boggle had sudden come to life and faced him. But he did what he was told, and saved his shoulders.”
“He did, he did?” She put her hands up to her throat a moment, as if to strangle the emotion that would not be suppressed, and in the act heard his footstep and turned.
He came with wonder and pleasure in his face.
“Audrey!” he exclaimed; “what good luck has brought you here?”
“I don’t know, Frank,” she answered a little wildly: “but it is good luck, and I thank it. Why do you, who hate hunting, hunt otters, sir?”
“Because they kill my fish,” he replied promptly.
“And so spoil your thinking, I suppose,” she said.
He seemed to understand in a moment, and his face flushed.
“Jake has been t-talking, has he?” he said. “Jake, I’m ashamed of you.”