"Can you tell me," she asked him, as he saw her and lifted his hat, "what time the Tennessee north-bound train leaves?"
"Twelve ten, miss," he answered, trying to read the suppressed mystery of her features. "Do you need me in dar? Dat man look' dangerous ter me, miss."
"Oh no." She shook her head and forced a smile. "But I want to ask—can you take us to the station, and a small trunk also?"
"Yes'm."
"Hold on!" It was Whaley's voice, and he had risen. "Tell that nigger to— Let me speak to him. Do you think I came down here to—"
Tilly thrust her small person between him and the window. She laid two opposing hands on his breast and checked him.
"I'm going to save you from murder— I will, I will!" she said, desperation filling her voice with power and causing his fierce stare to flicker. "If you meet my husband you will shoot him and the blood of a helpless, suffering, noble man will be on your head. You know what the brand on Cain was. You will bear it till you meet God with it on your brow. Do you think He'd forgive you? No, you'd have to burn for it in eternal torment, and you know it. You know you thanked God for sparing you before. Are you going to do even a worse thing now?"
He sank, half pushed down by her, into his chair. She saw the revolver, now exposed by his gaping pocket, and had an impulse to take it, but realized that the act would infuriate him anew. So she left it alone and stood squarely in front of him.
"You are not going to damn your soul," she went on, firmly. "Jesus, your Saviour and mine, forgave the guilty and you are refusing to pardon even the innocent. You are going to take me home. You are going to sit quietly there till I pack my trunk, and then we'll take the cab to the train."
He groaned under a vast inrolling wave of indecision, and stared at her like a helpless, thwarted child, and yet she knew that the flames smoldering within him were apt to burst at any moment.