“And by whom do you suppose the child has been stolen, if not by him?” retorted the gipsy.
“Nay,” said Duffham, “I should say she has not been stolen at all. It is difficult to steal girls of her age, remember. Last night was fine; the stars were bright as silver: perhaps, tempted by it, she went out a-roaming, and you will see her back in the course of the day.”
“I suspect him,” repeated Ketira, her great black eyes flashing their anger on Hyde’s cottage. “He acts cleverly; but, I suspect him.”
Drawing her scarlet cloak higher on her shoulders, she bent her steps towards Oxlip Dell. Duffham was turning on his way, when old Abel Crew came up. We called him “Crew,” you know, at Church Dykely.
“Are you looking for Kettie?” questioned Duffham.
“I don’t know where to look for her,” was Abel’s answer. “This morning I was out before sunrise searching for rare herbs: the round I took was an unusually large one, but I did not see anything of the child. Ketira suspects that Mr. Stockhausen must know where she is.”
“And do you suspect he does?”
“It is a question that I cannot answer, even to my own mind,” replied Abel. “That they were sometimes seen talking and walking together, is certain; and, so far, he may be open to suspicion. But, sir, I know nothing else against him, and I cannot think he would wish to hurt her. I am on my way to ask him.”
Interested by this time in the drama, Duffham followed Abel to Virginia Cottage. Hyde Stockhausen was in the little den that he made his counting-house, adding up columns of figures in a ledger, and stared considerably upon being thus pounced upon.
“I wonder what next!” he burst forth, turning crusty before Abel had got out half a sentence. “That confounded old gipsy has just been here with her abuse; and now you have come! She has accused me of I know not what all.”