‘If it’s as bad as that, what makes you stay here?’ she said slowly.
‘I like that!’ he replied. ‘You know as well as I do.’
She took fright at this, for she wasn’t sure of his meaning, though she knew in her heart what she wanted him to mean. She was afraid that he would guess at her unspoken admission.
‘I don’t keep you here,’ she said.
He got up and walked the room. A hay-moth hurled itself against the shade of the lamp with a sharp ringing sound and fell crippled on the tablecloth.
‘It’s hurt,’ she cried. ‘Kill it!’
Abner crushed the insect with his thumb and threw it in the fireplace. The coppery bloom came off on his fingers. For a moment she was hypnotised watching him. Then she recovered her senses.
‘I don’t keep you. There’s no need for you to stay in every night,’ she said.
‘No. There bain’t. I’m damned if there be!’ he replied.
He picked up his cap and walked out of the room. She nearly ran after him to thrust George’s letter into his hand. But she was too late. ‘So much the better,’ she thought. She felt that she had been saved from some calamity.