he
orchard with a basket over her arm, and walking quick towards the wood.
Then, sir, my heart sank. I felt sure she was going to meet the Captain.
However, I crept along the hedgerow, hiding myself, and got into the
wood almost as soon as Jessie got there, by another way. Under the cover
of the brushwood I stole on till I saw the Captain come out from the
copse on the other side of the path, and plant himself just before
Jessie. Then I saw at once I had wronged her. She had not expected to
see him, for she hastily turned back, and began to run homeward; but he
caught her up, and seized her by the arm. I could not hear what he said,
but I heard her voice quite sharp with fright and anger. And then he
suddenly seized her round the waist, and she screamed, and I sprang
forward--"

"And thrashed the Captain?"

"No, I did not," said Tom; "I had made a vow to myself that I never
would be violent again if I could help it. So I took him with one hand
by the cuff of the neck, and with the other by the waistband, and just
pitched him on a bramble bush,--quite mildly. He soon picked himself up,
for he is a dapper little chap, and became very blustering and abusive.
But I kept my temper, and said civilly, 'Little gentleman, hard words
break no bones; but if ever you molest Mrs. Somers again, I will carry
you into her orchard, souse you into the duck-pond there, and call all
the villagers to see you scramble out of it again; and I will do it
now if you are not off. I dare say you have heard of my name: I am Tom
Bowles.' Upon that his face, which was before very red, grew very white,
and muttering something I did not hear, he walked away.

"Jessie--I mean Mrs. Somers--seemed at first as much frightened at me
as she had been at the Captain; and though I offered to walk with her to
Miss Travers's, where she was going with a basket which the young lady
had ordered, she refused, and went back home. I felt hurt, and returned
to my uncle's the same evening; and it was not for months that I heard
the Captain had been spiteful enough to set up an opposition shop, and
that poor Will had been taken ill, and his wife was confined about the
same time, and the talk was that they were in distress and might have to
be sold up.

"When I heard all this, I thought that after all it was my rough tongue
that had so angered the Captain and been the cause of his spite, and so
it was my duty to make it up to poor Will and his wife. I did not know
how