he knew father
would not be so hard on Bessemer as on him. For father had taken a great
dislike to Herbert, and it was no wonder. He seemed to have no idea at
all that he was not owner of the house. He took anything he pleased for
his own use, even father's most sacred possessions, and broke them in a
fit of anger, too, sometimes, without ever saying he was sorry. He
talked very disrespectfully of father and to him, and acted so to the
servants that they gave notice and left. Every few days there would be a
terrible time over something Herbert had done. Once I remember he went
to the safe and got some money out that belonged to father and went off
and spent it in some dreadful way that made father very angry. Of course
I was still only a little girl, and I did not know all that went on.
Father was very careful that I should not know. He guarded me more than
ever, but he always looked sad when he came to kiss me good-night.

"Herbert took especial delight in tormenting me," she went on with a sad
far-away look in her eyes as if she were recalling unpleasant memories.
She did not see the set look on Reyburn's face nor notice his low
exclamation of anger. She went steadily on: "He found out that I did not
like June-bugs, and once he caught hundreds of them and locked me into a
room with them with all the lights turned on. I was almost frightened to
death, but it cured me of being afraid of June-bugs." A little smile
trembled out on Betty's lips. "Just because I wouldn't give him the
satisfaction of letting him hear me scream." She finished. "Then he
caught a snake and put it in my room, and he put a lot of burdocks in my
hat so they would get in my hair. Foolish things those were, of course,
but he was a constant nightmare to me. Sometimes he would tie a wire
across the passages in the upper hall where I had to pass to my room,
and when I fell my hands went down against a lot of slimy toads in the
dark, for he always somehow managed to have the light go out just as I
fell. There were hundreds of things like that, but I needn't multiply
them. That's the kind of boy he was. And because he discovered that my
father loved me very much, and because he knew my father disliked him,
he spent much time in trying to torment me in secret. I couldn't tell my
father, because he always looked so sad whenever there was trouble, and
there was sure to be trouble between him and my stepmother if my father
found out that Herbert had done anyt