"And you think I'll stay?" she cried.
"I think you will, for I shall not take you," he answered coolly. "Do you want the smallpox, silly child? Do you think your ladies will be as ready to hire you when you have lost your looks? Stay here, and in two hours I shall be back."
She cried that she would not stay; she would not stay! "I shall not!" she cried a third time. "Do you hear me? I shall go with you!"
"You will not!" Tom said. "And for a good reason, my girl. You heard that woman ask us whether we came from Beamond's, and you saw the way she looked at us. If it's known we've been there, there's not a house within ten miles will take us in, nor a coach will give us a lift. You have had one night out, you'll not bear another. Now, with me it is different."
"It is not," she cried. "I shall go."
"You will not," he said; and their eyes met. And presently hers dropped. "You will not," he repeated masterfully; "because I am the stronger, and I will tie you to a gate before you shall go. And you, little fool, will be thankful to me to-morrow. It's for your own good."
She gave way at that, crying feebly, for the night had shaken her. "Sit here in sight of the cottage," he continued, thrusting aside the brambles and making a place for her beside a tree, "and if you can sleep a little, so much the better. In two hours at the farthest I will be back."
She obeyed, watched him go, and saw his figure grow smaller and smaller, until it vanished at a turn of the road. She watched the woman of the cottage pass in and out with pail and pattens, and by-and-by she had to parry her questions. She saw the sun climb higher and higher in the sky, and heard the hum of the bees grow loud and louder, and felt the heat of the day take hold; and yet he did not return. And while she watched for him most keenly, as she imagined, she fell asleep.
When she awoke he was standing over her, and his face told her all. She sprang up. "You've not found her!" she cried, clasping her hands, and holding them out to him.
"No," he said. "There's no one in the house. No one but the dead."