“I’ve got to go,” she said.
“Gee, but you’re a coward, yuh are!” said he derisively. “What ’r yuh always so scared about? He always says he’ll lock yuh out, but he never does.”
“Yes, but he will,” she insisted nervously. “I think he has this time. You don’t know him. He’s something awful when he gets real mad. Oh, Connie, I must go!” For the sixth or seventh time she moved, and once more he caught her arm and waist and tried to kiss her, but she slipped away from him.
“Ah, yuh!” he exclaimed. “I wish he would lock yuh out!”
At her own doorstep she paused momentarily, more to soften her progress than anything. The outer door was open as usual, but not the inner. She tried it, but it would not give. It was locked! For a moment she paused, cold fear racing over her body, and then knocked.
No answer.
Again she rattled the door, this time nervously, and was about to cry out.
Still no answer.
At last she heard her father’s voice, hoarse and indifferent, not addressed to her at all, but to her mother.
“Let her go, now,” it said savagely, from the front room where he supposed she could not hear. “I vill her a lesson teach.”