"Where's who?"
She did not reply, but standing against the wall, she stared at him with a passionate scorn.
"You don't mean Sarah Norton?" asked Joe, slowly. Esther quivered. "Why, she came to tell me of the trouble her father was trying to get me into. But how did you come here, Esther? How did you know anything about it?"
She did not answer. Her head sank.
"How did you, Esther?"
"I saw—you in the lane," she faltered, then caught up her veil as though it had been a pinafore. Joe went up to her, and Jonas Ingram took hold of Harry Barker, and the two stepped outside, but not out of ear-shot; they were still curious. They could hear Esther's sobbing voice at intervals. "I tried to make 'em stop, but they wouldn't, and I slipped in past 'em and bolted the door; and when you came, I thought it was them—and, oh! ain't they our things, Joe?"
The old man thrust his head in at the door. "Yes," he roared, then withdrew.
"And won't they take the table away?"
"No," he roared again. "I'd just like to see 'em!"