After what seemed an interminable time, he heard once more the sound of voices in the kitchen—a man’s voice and Betty’s—then a quick firm step crossing the room to the house-door, and finally the retreating sounds of a horse’s feet. Then there was a scraping and bumping of furniture; the rim of light which had been perceptible but half-way down the door suddenly lengthened, the bolt grated in its hasps, and in another moment Betty stood before him.
Dick had been so long imprisoned in the darkness that at first he could hardly bear the flood of wintry light which burst upon him. And there, in the midst of it, was the woman, with so bright a face that he could scarce credit his eyes. She stretched out both hands to him and cried:—
“He be to live! Doctor says he be to live!” Her voice faltered and broke, the tears leaped from her eyes. “Thank God!” she cried. “Oh, thank God! He’ll live! My Jim’s to live!”
Dick came staggering forth from his cell. His brown face was blanched to a sickly pallor; he trembled in every limb. Choking back her sobs, Betty again extended her hand to him, and he wrung it; but, turning from her, he leaned against the wall, hiding his face. His shoulders were heaving.
“Doctor says he’ll not die,” pursued Betty betwixt laughing and crying. “He’s young and strong, he says, and he’ll get over it. ‘We’ll get as much lead as we can out of him,’ says doctor, ‘and he’ll carry the rest quite comfortable, as many another has done before him.’”
She laughed a feeble, wavering laugh that ended in a sob. “He said we’d best get him upstairs and put him to bed,” continued Betty. “Stubbs and another man come up from the village, so they carried him up; and doctor’s been with him a long time, and he’s sleepin’ now.”
She told her tale brokenly, with a little gasp between each word; but Dick made no comment. Presently he turned round again, his face still working.
“Mrs. Whittle,” he said unsteadily, “I’d like ye to hear me say so solemn as I can, as I’ll never lay another finger on any creature in the woods. I’ll never touch another feather——”
“Oh, it’s all right, it’s all right!” interrupted she quickly. “I’d like ye to hear me say summat too. I was mad last night, but I bain’t so hard-hearted as I made out. Even if my Jim had died I wouldn’t never ha’—I wouldn’t ha’ made a widow of your poor wife, nor yet an orphan o’ the baby.”