The woman came forward, gently raised her head, and held a bowl to her lips, from which she drank eagerly, and seemed much refreshed.
Once more the villain turned toward her, and said, with sullen ferocity:
“Well, my plucky fine lady, how much longer do you suppose you can stand this kind of thing?”
Editha made no reply, but her eyes, which seemed unnaturally large, now that she was so thin, gleamed defiance at him.
“You are getting weaker every day, and you’re getting so pale and poor that that fine young chap you’re so fond of would not know you if he should see you now,” he continued, heartlessly.
A look of inexpressible sadness settled upon the fair face, the white lids quivered a moment and then drooped over the blue eyes, and the pale lips trembled painfully; but she made no other sign of her suffering, uttered no word to his cruel taunt.
Her silence exasperated him, and, leaning down so that his face came almost on a level with hers, he hissed:
“You shall tell me where that paper is, or you shall never see the outside of these walls again. Do you hear?”
“I will never tell you,” she now said, in a weak voice, but with a firmness that made another fierce oath leap to his lips, and sent a shudder through her slight frame.
Earle ground his teeth, but waited to hear no more.