"Send them away?"
"I mean, send them off their farms," she explained hurriedly. "I was told--Tom told me that you were going to do so; and that some had held the land for generations, and would be heartbroken as well as ruined."
He did not answer at once, and his silence confirmed her in her fears. "I don't say that they have not deserved to be punished," she urged. "But--but I should not like my coming here to be remembered by this. And it seems out of proportion to the crime, since they did me no harm."
"Whatever they intended?"
"Yes."
He looked at her gravely. "What led you to think," he said, "that I had it in my mind to punish them in that way?"
"Well, Tom told me," she explained in growing confusion, "that you might do it to--that you might think it would please me. He said that any one in your place--I mean----"
"Any one newly married?"
Sophia's face flamed. "I suppose so," she murmured"--would do it."
"To please his bride? And you agreed with him, Sophia? You thought it was probable?"