“Oh, God Almighty!” she cried, “here he’s coming. I see him coming down the hazel road.”
“Hide me, mammy; hide me in the press. Oh, mammy, mammy, you wouldn’t give me to him!”
The boy had got into this large old-painted press, and coiled himself up between two shelves. There was hardly a moment to think; and yielding to the instinct of her desperate affection, and to the child’s wild appeal, she locked the door, and put the key in her pocket.
She sat down. She was half stunned by her own audacity. She scarcely knew what she had done. Before she could recover herself, the door darkened, a hand crossed the hatch and opened it, and ex-Sergeant-Major Archdale entered the cottage.
In curt military fashion he announced himself, and demanded the boy.
She was looking straight in this formidable man’s face, and yet it seemed as if he were vanishing from before her eyes.
“Where’s the boy?” inquired the chill stern voice of the Sergeant.
It seemed to her like lifting a mountain this effort to speak. She felt as if she were freezing as she uttered the denial.
“He aint here.”
“Where is he?” demanded the Sergeant’s imperturbably clear cold voice.