“Ah, that is the sort of woman I like!”
“You make me know what it is to feel like a murderess!”
“And to look like one, by heaven!”
She wrenched herself away, with a furious effort.
“Coward!” she cried. “I did right to mistrust you!”
Little Martha ran up and offered her a wild heartsease which she had found on one of the graves. Hadria, trembling and white, stooped instinctively to take the flower, and as she did so, the whole significance of the afternoon’s revelation broke over her, with fresh intensity. His child!
He stood watching her, with malice in his eyes.
“Come, come, Martha, let us go, let us go,” she cried, feverishly.
He moved backwards along the path, as they advanced.
“I have to thank you for bestowing a mother’s care on my poor child. You can suppose what a joy the thought has been to me all along.”