Lovey pointed to the amphora.
"My father rates me higher than a bit of old glass."
"You'm daft to think so! Why for should he care a cuss for you? More like he hates you, for you'm no daughter worth naming to him—a froward, man-loving minx, as plays fast an' loose with them he hates, an' defies him. Love the likes of you better'n fifteen thousand pound! He'm not all fool."
Thunder suddenly broke overhead, and subterranean echoes in the grotto answered it. The noise punctuated Lovey's speech and appeared to affirm her purpose.
"Die you shall," she said. "God do so to me if I don't mean it."
"I know you mean it now," answered the girl. "And, since everything is lost at the Prison, I care not very much about living. Yet, after all, 'tis only a passing reverse; therefore, I plead to live. Life is life. Somehow this choking hole makes me long to live. I hate your money and your treasures. I hate the gold in your bags as much as I hate the moss on these walls that mocks it. I want to breathe sweet air and see the sky again. I'll keep your secret. Don't kill me, Lovey. 'Twill ruin your own life if you do."
"Life's worth living, as you say. For all my cares and years and cruel disappointments, I like it. But you hearken to the thunder—I knowed 'twas brewing—you know too much. Let it rage! I wish 'twould drown Short's cottage, an' him in it, an' the Prison, an' the prisoners, an' the sojers, an' every living thing. You know too much an' I won't take your word."
"You're worn out and frantic. Sleep upon it."
The old woman reflected.
"So I will, then," she said. "Never heard better counsel. But you—you must sleep too——"