“I’d tear you limb from limb if you did!” Bess cried in the old tone of violence. And the look which accompanied the words matched them. But the next moment, “If I could believe you,” she said more quietly, “it would be well and good. But——”
“You may believe me. Why should I do him harm?”
Bess bit her nails in doubt; and for the first time since her entrance she turned her eyes from her rival. Perhaps for this reason Henrietta’s courage rose. She told herself that she had been foolish to feel fear a few minutes before: that she had allowed herself to be scared by a few rude words, such as women of this class used on the least provocation. And the temptation to drop the matter if she could escape uninjured gave way to a brave determination to do all that was possible. She resolved to be firm, yet prudent; and to persevere. And when the dialogue was resumed the tone on each side was more moderate.
“Well,” Bess said, with a grudging air, “perhaps you may not wish to do him harm. I don’t know, my lass. But you may do it, all the same.”
“How?”
“If you think he is here you are mistaken.”
Henrietta had already come to this conclusion.
“Still,” she said, “I can go to him.”
“I don’t see how you are to go to him.”
“I will go anywhere.”