'But how--what makes you think that I have got it?' I muttered hoarsely. 'What makes you come to me?'
To confess, of my own motive and unsuspected, had been bad enough and shameful enough; but to be accused, unmasked, convicted--and by her! This was too much. My face burned, my eyes were hot as fire.
She twisted the fingers of one hand tightly round the other, but she did not look up. 'You took it from the child's neck as we passed through the ford,' she said in a low voice, 'that night I lost it.'
'I did!' I exclaimed. 'I did, girl?'
She nodded firmly, her lip trembling. But she never looked up; nor into my face!
Yet her insistence angered me. How did she know, how could she know? I put the question into words. 'How do you know?' I said harshly. 'Who told you so? Who told you this--this lie, woman?'
'The child,' she answered, shivering under my words.
I opened my mouth and drew in my breath. I had never thought of that. I had never thought, save once for a brief moment, of the child talking, and, on the instant, I stood speechless; convicted and confounded! Then I found my voice again.
'The child told you!' I muttered incredulously. 'The child? Why, it cannot talk!'
'It can,' she said, her voice breaking. 'It can talk to me, and I can understand it. Oh, I am so sorry!' And with that she broke down. She turned away and, covering her face with her hands, began to sob bitterly. Her shoulders heaved, and her slender frame shook with the storm.