“I knew it would come to it,” he cried. “Curse him! I’ll crush his false head again the rocks.”
“Are you mad, father?” she whispered, throwing her arms round him.
“Mad? No,” he cried; “but do you think I’m blind as well as old? Bess,” he continued, “I wish before his gashly face had darkened our door—”
“Oh father, father, dear father,” she moaned—and she crept closer and closer, till her arms were round his neck, and her head in his breast; “kill me, but don’t hurt him.”
“Then he has been trifling with thee, girl? I knowed it; I was sure it would come.”
“No, no, no,” moaned Bess; “he never said word to me but what you might hear.”
“Is—is this gawspel, Bess?” cried the old man, dragging up her convulsed and tearful face, and gazing in her wistful dark eyes.
“Can’t you see, father?” she said, with a low, despairing sigh. “I’m not good enough to be his wife, and he’s not the man to trifle and say soft things to me. You see down yonder,” she added, pitifully, as she waved one brown hand in the direction of the path.
“Nay, it’s along of Madge Mullion,” said the old man, wrathfully. “Yon’s nothing, and will come to naught. They say old Paul’s niece—”
“It’s a lie, father, a cruel lie,” cried Bess, starting from him. “I heard it, and it’s a lie. Mr Trethick’s a gentleman, and he’s as noble as he’s good.”