Stop," cried Sedgett. "Do you people here think me a fool? Eccles, you
know me better 'n that. That young woman's my wife. I've come for her, I
tell ye."

"You've no claim on her," Rhoda burst forth weakly, and quivered, and
turned her eyes supplicatingly on Robert. Dahlia was a statue of icy
fright.

"You've thrown her off, man, and sold what rights you had," said Robert,
spying for the point of his person where he might grasp the wretch and
keep him off.

"That don't hold in law," Sedgett nodded. "A man may get in a passion,
when he finds he's been cheated, mayn't he?"

"I have your word of honour," said Rhoda; muttering, "Oh! devil come to
wrong us!"

"Then, you shouldn't ha' run ferreting down in my part o' the country.
You, or Eccles--I don't care who 'tis--you've been at my servants to get
at my secrets. Some of you have. You've declared war. You've been trying
to undermine me. That's a breach, I call it. Anyhow, I've come for my
wife. I'll have her."

"None of us, none of us; no one has been to your house," said Rhoda,
vehemently. "You live in Hampshire, sir, I think; I don't know any more.
I don't know where. I have not asked my sister. Oh! spare us, and go."

"No one has been down into your part of the country," said Robert, with
perfect mildness.

To which Sedgett answered bluffly, "There ye lie, Bob Eccles;" and he was
immediately felled by a tremendous blow. Robert strode over him, and
taking Dahlia by the elbow, walked three paces on, as to set her in
motion. "Off!" he cried to Rhoda, whose eyelids cowered under the blaze
of his face.

It was best that her sister should be away, and she turned and walked
swiftly, hurrying Dahlia, and touching her. "Oh! don't touch my arm,"
Dahlia said, quailing in the fall of her breath. They footed together,
speechless; taking the woman's quickest gliding step. At the last stile
of the fields, Rhoda saw that they were not followed. She stopped,
panting: her heart and eyes were so full of that flaming creature who was
her lover. Dahlia took from her bosom the letter she had won in the
morning, and held it open in both hands to read it. The pause was short.
Dahlia struck the letter into her bosom again, and her starved features
had some of the bloom of life. She kept her right hand in her pocket, and
Rhoda presently asked,--

"What have you there?"

"You are my enemy, dear, in some things," Dahlia replied, a muscular
shiver passing over her.

"I think," said