She dropped into a chair and cried. Armstrong passed out of the kitchen. The girls listened, and Dick, chalky white, with his mouth open, as Paul had seen him on his way through. They heard the swish, swish, swish of the tawse, and not another sound but hard breathing for a full minute; then Paul began to groan, and then to shriek.
‘Now,’ panted Armstrong, ‘shall I have the truth?’
There was no answer, and he fell to again; but Paul turned and caught his arm, and after an ineffectual struggle, the old man dropped the tawse and walked into the kitchen. Paul dressed and sat on the table, quivering all over. He sat there for hours, and nobody approached him until at last the servant, with frightened eyes, came to make ready for dinner; then he got up and went to his old refuge in the lumber-room. One of his sisters brought him food after the family dinner-hour, but he refused it passionately.
‘Oh, Paul,’ she said, clinging to him till he shook her from his writhing shoulders, ‘why don’t you confess?’
‘Confess what? snarled Paul. ‘Confess I was born into a family of fools and nincompoops? That’s all I’ve got to confess.’
He was left to himself all day, and at night he went un-chidden to the larder, and helped himself to bread and cheese. He took a jug to the pump, and coming back, ate his meal, standing amongst his people like an outlaw.
‘Well, Paul,’ said his father, ‘are ye in the mind to make a clean breast of it?’
‘No,’ said Paul, ‘I’m not.’
The defiance fell like a thunderbolt, and eyes changed with eyes all round the room in horror and amazement.
‘We’ll see in the morning,’ Armstrong said.