“Going? What for?”
“To find him and bring him back.”
“Whatcher talking about? You go and fetch doctor.”
“About Tom Candlish. I went to the Hall last night, and he was gone.”
“What, young squire? Well, you mustn’t go after him, gel.”
“Yes, I must,” said Dally, with a lurid look in her dark eyes. “I’m going after him to bring him back here, gran’fa. But are you sure you threw that stuff away?”
“Ay, I’m sure enough. Now go and fetch doctor, I tell you; and ask him to give you some more of it if your eyes are bad. Now go.”
Dally nodded shortly, neither displaying, nor being expected to display, any affection for her grandfather, as she left the cottage; when the old man relit his pipe and sat back thinking as he smoked.
“What does she want with that stuff?” he said thoughtfully; “’tis poison, and she knowed where it was. She wouldn’t want to take none herself. She wouldn’t do that; and she wouldn’t want to give none to Tom Candlish, because that wouldn’t make him marry her. I dessay she wants it—she wants it—to—”
The old man’s drowsy head had sunk back, his pipe-holding hand fell in his lap, and he slept heavily, to wake, after a few hours, cold and shivering, ready to creep to bed, murmuring against the doctor for not coming, and forgetting all about Dally and her desire to get that bottle which used to stand in the corner cupboard.