"To Bishop Wycliffe's."
"No!" he cried.
"Why not?" she questioned. "It 's an easier place than this one. There are no young men there, Tom. That ought to satisfy you. I saw Miss Wycliffe to-day."
"I don't like the bishop," he said, with some hesitation, as if aware of the lameness of the objection, "and he does n't like me. There 's no man in this town more opposed to me than he is. I don't want you to go there."
"You never let me do what I want to, Tom," she complained despairingly.
He caught her in his arms and gave her an exasperated kiss. The logic of the argument was with her, and he could meet it only by an unreasonable prohibition. "I don't want you to go, anyhow," he reiterated.
"But I 've got to go somewhere," she insisted, placing her two hands upon his shoulders. She attempted to give him a little shake, with the result that she shook only herself. His physical immobility was so suggestive of his mental attitude that she desisted, with sudden meekness, and the point was apparently settled as he wished. He possessed himself of her hand, and began to stroke the inside of her arm, as if he had discovered a new charm in her.
"If you did n't give him what he deserved, what did you do, Lena?" he demanded, going back to the incident that had aroused his jealousy.
"I drew away, Tom."
"As gentle as a kitten, and without a word, too, I 'll be bound. You 're altogether too pretty—that's the trouble with you. I ought to put you in a cage, to keep you safe."