'No.'
She still hurried the girl along, now at a faster pace, for they walked on fairly level down.
The day had completely closed in; all, however, was not inky darkness. On looking behind, seen through a blur of mist, could be caught some glimmer of lights from Seaton. There was, perhaps, a moon above the clouds, but the light sufficed only to show that there was not absolute obscurity above.
It was to Winefred as though life was being left behind, and they were plunging into boundless and black despair.
A wheeling gull screamed in her ear.
Suddenly the mother halted.
The wind lashed her hair, and flapped her sodden gown. She gripped Winefred now with both hands, and turning her back to the blast and splashing rain, said, 'Child! you shall know all now, now that there is no place whatever left for us. Your father has deserted you, he has abandoned me. He did this nineteen years ago. Not a word, not a shilling has he sent me. I know neither where he is, nor what he has been doing. He may be rich, he may be poor. He may be in blustering health, he may be sick or dead. Neither by letter nor by messenger have I been told—and I care not. I love him no more. I hate the man who has suffered us to come to this. Child, if a father can be stone to his own child, if a hus——if a man who has loved a woman can forget her who loved him with her whole young fresh heart—then is it a marvel that other men on whom we have no claim, to whom bound by no ties, are stone also? Child—you and I are alone. We are everything to each other. I have none but you; you have none but me. If I go, you are lost. If you go—I am no more. We are tied up in one another, to live and die together. Come on.'
Again she turned and faced the tearing, rain-laden wind.
'Mother, I cannot take another step,' sobbed the girl.
'We have not far to go.'