But before she could say anything more the woman had taken her by the arm and whispered:
“We shall be the best of friends. There is nothing Miss Standish can ask me to do that I will be unwilling to try.”
Nellie shook off the white fingers.
“Don’t touch me,” shivered the girl; “I will not have you near me, do you understand? I won’t have you in my Biddy’s place. I will bid you good-night, Mr. Benson, and say that when I am twenty-one, I shall come back and you shall leave this house, but now, to-night, do you hear,” and the girl bent far forward and looked into the man’s eyes, “do you understand, I am going back to the boathouse with my Biddy.”
With this sweeping statement, she flung herself out of the room, and fled upstairs, and she no sooner came near the door but she heard the sound of sobs. Opening it, she saw Biddy down upon her knees beside a trunk throwing her things in promiscuously.
“What are you doing, Biddy?” asked the girl sternly.
“Mr. Benson has told me to leave, and, darlint, it is better for you. I am not a lady, he says, but I loved you, child; I loved you.”
“Biddy, listen to me. Are you going back to the boathouse?”
“Yes.”
“Then I am going with you. I just told Mr. Benson, too, and also said to that vixen in a black dress, who he said was to be my companion, that I would have nothing to do with her.”