She stole a hand into his, and then repeated to him all that Dorothy had told her.
He listened with fast-growing anger; and then, coupled with his first outburst of rage against the hated redcoat, were reproaches for his wife, that she had not sooner informed him of the trouble.
"He would never have left the house alive, had I known it before," he cried savagely. "As it is, I'll ride after him as soon as day comes, and call him to an accounting for his villany,—the dastardly scoundrel! And Mary—oh, my wife, how could you keep it from me till now?"
Her heart sank at this, the first note of reproof or displeasure his voice had ever held for her.
"You must remember, Jack," she pleaded, "how sorely I was distressed to know what to do, for I had given my promise to Dot, and could not break it. And you must know as well that it was not until this very evening that I learned of the matter."
"True," he admitted. "But"—persistently—"there was the ruby ring, when the child was first taken ill; how could you keep that from me?"
He spoke reproachfully, but his voice was growing softer, and his anger was now gone, for Mary was sobbing, her head against his breast. And this was as strange to him as his harsh words had been to her.
"I'll never—never keep any matter from you again," she protested brokenly. "I promise it, Jack, for now I see it was very wrong."
"There—there, sweetheart," he said soothingly, as he stroked her bright hair,—"'t is all well for us now, and will ever be, if you but keep to what you say. But Dot—poor little Dot!" And his anger came again.
"Oh, that villain, that cursed villain,—but he shall reckon with me for this outrage! And 't is well for that scoundrel Weeks that he's been made to flee the town for his seditious sentiments and preachings."