“He has followed me,” she thought, with some alarm, and turned her head quickly.
Then a low cry of dismay and anger came from her lips.
Mr. Finley, the grocer, her feared and hated stepfather, was walking along by her side, leering wickedly down into her face with an air of recognition that almost made her heart stop its beating.
“Good afternoon, Pansy. I am glad to see that you are making it up with your old lover. I was behind a tree, watching you two while you sat on that bench talking. You find the old love as sweet as ever, eh? Well, no one can blame you for not loving that old man you married for his money,” were the impertinent words that greeted her astonished ears.
She drew herself up haughtily, and tried to freeze him with her indignant glance.
“Get out of my path, you wretch! How dare you persist in pretending to recognize me as some one you have known?” she exclaimed angrily; but he only laughed, and, staying close by her side, retorted:
“Somebody else recognized you as some one he had known before, too, Mrs. Falconer. Didn’t I hear Norman Wylde calling you Pansy an hour or so ago, when you first came up to him?”
She trembled with horror at the accusation, but, remembering that she had not admitted the truth to Norman Wylde, took courage.
“Pshaw! Resemblances are common,” she said carelessly. “I do not deny that Mr. Wylde took me for some one else, but he immediately apologized for his mistake, and if you had the instincts of a gentleman you would do the same.”
“But I have not made a mistake,” leered Finley. He kept along by her side, although she was walking fast, and continued: “Pansy, you had as well own up to me, for I have recognized you, and I mean to make money out of my knowledge. I am poor, and I have your mother and sisters to support. You are rich, and you must give me some money for them, or I will betray you to your husband.”