cobbles outside the kitchen door.

'Yur feyther!' cried Jim between his teeth. 'Gang upstairs wi' ye.' And
he pointed to a door in the wall concealing a staircase to the upper
storey.

She sprang up, looked at the door and at him irresolutely, and then
stayed where she was, gaunt, pale, fever-eyed, the wreck and ghost of
her old self.

The steps neared. There was a rough voice in the kitchen, a surprised
exclamation, and her father had pushed past his brother into the room.

John Backhouse no sooner saw his daughter than his dull weather-beaten
face flamed into violence. With an oath he raised the heavy whip he held
in his hand, and flung himself towards her.

'Naw, ye'll not du'at!' cried Jim, throwing himself with all his feeble
strength on to his brother's arm. John swore and struggled, but the old
man stuck like a limpet.

'You let 'un aleann,' said Mary, drawing her tattered shawl over her
breast. 'If he aims to kill me, _aa_'ll not say naa. But he needn't
moider hisself! There's them abuve as ha' taken care o' that!'

She sank again into her chair, as though her limbs could not support
her, and her eyes closed in the utter indifference of a fatigue which
had made even fear impossible.

The father's arm dropped; he stood there sullenly looking at her. Jim,
thinking she had fainted, went up to her, took a glass of water out of
which she had already been drinking from the mahogany table, and held it
to her lips. She drank a little, and then with a desperate effort raised
herself, and clutching the arm of the chair, faced her father.

'Ye'll not hev to wait lang. Doan't ye fash yersel. Maybe it ull comfort
ye to knaw summat! Lasst Midsummer Day aa was on t' Shanmoor road, i' t'
gloaming. An' aa saw theer t' bogle--thee knaws, t' bogle o' Bleacliff
Tarn; an' she turned hersel, an' she spoak to me!'

She uttered the last words with a grim emphasis, dwelling on each, the
whole life of the wasted face concentrated in the terrible black eyes,
which gazed past the two figures within their immediate range into a
vacancy peopled with horror. Then a film came over them, the grip
relaxed, and she fell back with a lurch of the rocking-chair in a dead
swoon.

With the help of the neighbour from next door, Jim got her upstairs into
the room that had been hers. She awoke from her swoon only to fall into
the torpid sleep of exhaustion, which lasted for twelve hours.

'Keep her oot o' ma way,' said the father with an oa