The boy shoved his food away from him untouched, and looked across the table to meet Beth’s frightened eyes.
“Don’t you worry, kid,” he added reassuringly, “I won’t hurt him, and he can’t hurt me—except with his gun.” The girl shuddered, and he hastened to add:
“He wouldn’t do that, Beth. Don’t you think it for a minute! Even when he’s drunk he wouldn’t do that—he’s too much of a coward—he knows he’d swing for it.”
“He said he would, Tom.”
“He said he would if I come up here again. I didn’t come, did I?”
It was a month now since her stepfather in drunken rage had ordered Tom from the house and threatened to shoot him if he ever came there again. But after all, he had to come tonight, as things happened. And her stepfather was away—the first time he had been away in months—and he need never know that Tom had been here.
“He won’t be back until tomorrow—you’ll be gone then,” said Beth, voicing her thoughts.
Her words seemed to rouse the boy to sudden anger. “Why should he forbid my seeing you, anyway?” he went on, resentfully. “I love you, Beth, and you love me. And I want to marry you!” His tone changed abruptly. “You do love me, Beth?”
He held out his arms appealingly, and in answer the girl rose silently and kissed him. “You know that, Tom,” she said simply.
“Then why do I have to sneak away like a thief? Just because we love each other, what’s that he’s got against me?”