“Help me down, please,” she said in a husky voice, “I want to speak to you. Let me come inside.”
“Are you coming too?” said Dick, not very graciously, to Ugthorpe, as he helped Freda down.
“No, no, don’t you come, Barnabas,” said the girl quickly, turning to the farmer. “I want to speak to Dick by himself. You wait for me.”
Barnabas, laughed with some constraint.
“Ah doan’t knaw what Ah’m to seay to that.”
“Why, do as she wishes. She shan’t come to any harm, Ugthorpe,” said Dick with a break in his voice.
But the farmer still hesitated.
“Ah’m not afreaid of you, Mr. Richard. But—who have ye gotten abaht t’ pleace?”
Dick flushed as he answered quickly: “Nobody who can or will do any harm to Miss Mulgrave.”
This answer, while it reassured Barnabas, alarmed Freda. For it seemed to confirm her fears that it was her father who was in hiding about the farm.