LITMIR.BIZ

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It had inflicted an ugly bruise on his forehead, but the worse damage had been caused by a bent nail projecting from the wood, which had made a long, deep tear beneath the cheekbone, which was bleeding freely.

      It was a disconcerting wound, but by no means sufficient to disable him, or to have deterred a more resolute man. Probably the game was still his, had he played it better. Women have been taken by force often enough from the time of the Sabines, or of the children of Benjamin, and have learnt to kiss their captors.

      But Norwood had had enough.

      CHAPTER VIII

      That had been yesterday. She had recrossed the island in advance of Norwood and swum the channel while the water was still high, so that, as he could not swim, it was some hours before he could follow.

      She had been elated with the ease of her victory, and greeted Jephson with more than usual affability. He told her that there was still some water in the pool, but that it was low and muddy. Many birds were resorting to it, and the sheep drank there, as their tracks showed. Now that the cows were also going, it must soon be dry unless rain came. He proposed that they should all work in the morning at fencing it off, which would keep it clean, and they could dole it out at their discretion.

      He had asked what they had found, and then, perhaps foolishly, she had told him of Norwood’s attempt against herself, and of how she had foiled it.

      He had heard her in silence, and then looked at her for some time in a speculative way before saying: “We’ll wait till he comes back, and then I’ll do the talking.”

      It had been late when Norwood returned, and he had seemed reluctant to face the older man, muttering something about having had an accident, and passing on to his room.

      Jephson had made a motion to stop him, and then turned back. “He don’t count,” he said shortly, and had sat down opposite to Claire, with a table between them, and spoken with the slow deliberation of one who had thought and decided. It was not an argument, but a verdict.

      “Now, my wench, see here. You’re in my ’ouse, and you’re my gal, an’ you’ll do what I says. I’m master ’ere and you’ll both learn it—or go. P’raps you know where. I doesn’t.”

      “But the cows are mine, Mr. Jephson,” she had interposed, reverting to the earlier argument in what she had meant to be a light and friendly tone, but he had continued unheeding. He spoke now with a slow emphasis that left no doubt of his meaning.

      “When—I—want—you—I’ll—’ave—you. An’ that won’t be long neither. You’re mine. You may larn it soon, or larn it late, you’ve got to larn it.” He brought a heavy hand down flatly on the board. “But don’t you think as you’ll use your tricks wi’ me. By Gawd!” and his eyes fixed on her own, that tried to meet them steadily, and he raised his voice in a burst of anger, “I’d tan you till you couldn’t walk for a week—nor sit. But you’re one to see sense,” he added more quietly, “an’ I ain’t greedy no’ow. I don’t want no quarrels. A wench ain’t worth it. When I say you’re his’n, you’re his’n, an’ when I say you’re mine, you’re mine.”

      He had looked at her for a long moment in silence, as though waiting for her to answer, and then, apparently satisfied, as she made no response, he had risen and walked out.

      Then she had gone to her own room, and behind the futile safeguards of lock and bolt had blamed herself for the cowardice that had made no answer, and congratulated herself on her discretion, and had tried to persuade herself that it was wisdom rather than fear which had impelled her to silence.

      Certainly she had needed time for thought, but thought had brought no comfort. Were they the only men that the world held, it made no difference. She loathed them both. The sight of Jephson in the yard beneath, busily measuring some timbers, his mind full of his proposed fencing of the pond, did nothing to reassure her. In his slow, deliberate mind he had weighed her up, and told her what her fate would be. Then he had reverted to more important problems.

      She thought of the cowardly brutality of the man who had assaulted, and yet had lacked the manhood to overcome her, and then of this other who would be content to share her with him, so long as he were recognised as the master. He wouldn’t even keep her to himself if it should mean a quarrel. “A wench ain’t worth it.” Was she to live at the will of such as these, and bear their children?

      Surprisingly, she had gone to sleep very quickly, and had slept so well that she had not heard Jephson at work on the outside of her door. Not that he cared whether she heard him or not.

      Perhaps he had given her more thought than she supposed. Probably he quite understood the feeling towards himself underlying the polite friendliness with which she usually addressed him. He prided himself on his practical efficiency, and he would not have spoken so confidently had he not “measured the job” as he put it to his own mind.

      She woke early from a strange dream of sinking into immeasurable depths and with an unaccountable feeling of giddiness, and hearing no sound from the rooms below, where the men slept, had resolved to come out and find the cows to drive them down for the milking. Leaving her room, she had noticed that a heavy bolt had been fixed to the outside of the door. It had not been shot to confine her, and left her to puzzle over the intention which it indicated. Probably to confine her should she give further trouble till she should be starved into complacency.

      It gave her fresh food for thought—thought which hardened into a determination not to be coerced by such men, nor by such methods, and yet which could form no plan by which their lives could combine tolerably, and she maintain her integrity, if they were united against her.

      CHAPTER IX

      Over these events which have been briefly told, and over others which there is no need for telling, Claire’s mind had wandered as she watched a calm sea wrinkle to a summer breeze; but as she found no issue, she resolved that she must play for time until she had contrived some plan by which she could play for safety, and that she would gain nothing by rousing the suspicion that she was not returning with the cows as usual, or by leaving the men to make common cause against her while she were absent. On her way back to the house the feeling of giddiness with which she had wakened returned, but more strongly, so that she staggered, and part of the milk was spilled. For some time she lay on the turf while the sky swayed above, and she felt as though the ground were sinking beneath her. But this passed, and she rose with a feeling of unaccustomed sickness.

      She found the men together at their morning meal when at last she came in with the milk pail. She knew that they had been discussing her from a look which Norwood gave before his glance fell nervously beneath her own, but neither spoke, and it was her own policy to draw their thoughts to the day’s work, as though the incidents of the previous one were forgotten. Norwood’s face was not a pleasant sight, the forehead swollen and discoloured, and the left cheek caked with dirt and blood, which he had omitted to wash lest the bleeding should start afresh. But it was not a subject to which any of them was likely to allude. Jephson had other things on his mind, and was proceeding to explain his programme and to allot to each of them the task by which they could best assist it, when an event happened of the kind which so often shows the vanity of human forethought or apprehension.

      Clare’s fears and Jephson’s plans went the same road when a thin stream of water from the yard outside hesitated for a moment on the sill and trickled down into the kitchen.

      The kitchen was the oldest part of an old house, and was built at the time when floors were sunk, so that the strewn rushes should not be drawn out by careless feet. Probably it had then been the best room in the house, which had since decayed and been rebuilt around it. Its floor, now flagged, was several inches lower than the yard from which the water dripped so gently, yet with a quietly increasing volume.

      Claire noticed it first, but did not speak, which was a measure of her mental aloofness, and it was a few seconds before she realised its significance. Jephson saw it next, and knew its cause in a moment, but he was a man of slow speech, and he stared silently while his mind grappled with the problem which it presented.

      Norwood

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