"I think," she said one day to Tom, "that, if you think bad things of me, I ought not to stay here and eat your bread."
"You eat your husband's," said Tom. "He pays for it—an' where would 'ee go to, eh?" Then his own words shamed him. Where could she go, poor lass, if they were hard on her?
"I doan't want to be unfriendly," he said; "seeing that, happen, ye didn't mean much harm, an', arter all——"
"Thank you; but, if you can't believe me, I don't want that kind of friendship—I must do without," said the preacher's wife. Her gesture forbade his completing his sentence, and actually made Tom feel rather small, though her voice was gentle enough. Yet, in spite of those brave-sounding words, she was not the woman to "do without". She was by no means cast in a self-sufficing mould; whatever heroism she might be capable of would always have its roots in the strength of her affections, and his "where would 'ee go?" made her feel very helpless.
The preacher came back a few days later. Meg, coming down early one morning, found him asleep on the wooden settle, with his head on the table.
Meg shut the door softly, and stood considering him—this man who had been her prophet, and was, alas, her husband!
He had tramped a long way, and he slept heavily.
Should she tell him the whole inexplicable story when he woke, or not?
There was a force of character, an uncompromising arbitrariness about all the Thorpes that she rather shrank from; but Barnabas was always good to her.
She had declared to George Sauls that she trusted the preacher absolutely; and so she did—so she must—for what would happen if she didn't? As the question rose in her mind, Meg's heart answered it with startling clearness. She could not afford to lose one tittle of her carefully nourished respect for Barnabas. She was afraid, not of him, but of herself. She couldn't risk this thing; if he, like Tom, were to tell her she lied, she knew she should hate him; for she was too much in his power.