“Nay, I could not tell him—I love him so,” she said. “I got up and ran away to bed, leaving him there, his head on the seat I had left, and, oh, Nan! all night long I dreamed I could still hear him breathing heavily like that and calling ‘Anny, Anny, Anny.’ Oh, Nan! tell him for me, tell him for me! I could not stay in the Ship and he there not knowing. Both our hearts would break.”
Nan looked at her curiously.
“I will tell him,” she said.
A sigh of relief broke from Anny’s lips and Nan went on: “I did not know you had wedded with the Spaniard, lass; why did you so? You must have been mad; what will ye do now?”
Anny looked at her in astonishment.
“I had no choice,” she said. “Pet——”
A light of understanding swept over Nan’s expressive face and she sprang to her feet.
“Miserable hell-cat that I am,” she exclaimed, her great voice shaking with fury, “to be turned aside by Pet’s damned witchcraft, and sent home without having done aught. Oh, why did ye do it, lass, why did ye do it?”
Anny shrugged her shoulders.
“’Tis nothing, Mother, nothing,” she said wearily. “I shall not be known as his wife. There will be no difference, save that I cannot wed with Hal.” Once again her voice broke on the name.