"I couldn't wish anybody any worse harm than to have to live with that fellow," he muttered to himself. "'Tis a poor look-out for 'em, poor toads!"
The thought of Huldah, and the desire not to be mixed up in the affair, sent him home and to bed, to be out of the way. So he went to sleep, and tried to forget what he had done, and his three florins remained untouched in his pocket until morning.
In the meantime Tom Smith had made his way stealthily down the lane until he reached the little cottage. At the gate he stopped, and peering about him, listened for a time, while he tried to plan what his first move should be. Should he be civil and friendly, or should he just go in and frighten them all? As he stood there debating he looked like some mean beast of prey, waiting to spring on his victim. A cheerful light shone out of one of the little windows, and in the stillness of the night the sound of voices reached him. One he recognised at once as Huldah's. A savoury smell of cooking was wafted out to him, and roused him to greater anger.
"That little hussy is a-selling of her baskets, I'll be bound, and she and the old woman live on the fat of the land with the money that they bring. My baskets, I calls 'em. It's sheer thieving! A fine old yarn she'll have told, too, and a nice character she'll have give'd me, ugh, the little—"
A ripple of laughter sounded through the silence. To him it seemed as though Huldah were mocking him. Hesitating no longer, he strode up the path and knocked heavily on the door. Instantly the voices and the laughter ceased. There was a spring at the door and a growl. Dick had scented the enemy! Then after a moment's pause a voice asked timidly, "Who is there?"
Tom Smith heard the alarm in the voice, and rejoiced. It gave him the greatest pleasure always to know that he inspired fear in anyone.
"Open the door. It's me, Tom Smith, and I've come after that dog of mine that you've stole!"
No answer came, nor was the door opened.
"Open the door, I say, or I'll fetch the police for you! pack of thieves that you are!"
The threat of the police would have made Huldah smile, if she had not been in such a state of terror for herself, and even more so for Dick. She knew that her "uncle" would not go within a mile of a policeman if he could help it. Indeed, she longed and prayed for a policeman to come along then, that she might appeal to him for protection.