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"My mother.... Oh, Tessibel, it'll be all right " He paused, then finished despairingly, "My mother wants me to marry her!" Tess caught the picture his words suggested; then recoiled as if death in monstrous guise had appeared before her, open-armed. Incredulous horror leapt alive in her eyes. He had said, "My mother wants me to marry Madelene Waldstricker."
"Oh, I didn't know," observed Waldstricker. "I must have been away at the time." He drew out his watch and looked at it. "Shall we go on down, Helen? It's a little early. I told the girl I'd come at two, but a half an hour doesn't matter.... I can't rest until I get hold of that dwarf." During the interval in which Helen went for her garden hat, Waldstricker said to Deforrest,
Her gentle temper didn't take fire easily, but even to her endurance there were limits. "You seem to forget, Mr. Waldstricker," she retorted sharply, "that your men tore down the old woman's home and your money procured the perjury that sent the dwarf to Auburn. It strikes me you'd better not throw stones at Forrie." Waldstricker jumped to his feet and rushed to his wife's side.
'Tain't very big, but no one but me ever goes up there. You, there, under the bed, ye ain't 'fraid of bats or owls, air ye?" "Nope," came forth a sweet voice. "I ain't 'fraid of nothin' nor nobody but Ed Waldstricker and Sandy Letts." Tess giggled in glee.
Each moment she grew more frightened, and from the corner of her eye measured the distance between their place and the piano. Oh, how thankful she was when Miss Young took a seat beside her. Near the door she recognized Madelene Waldstricker. Across the distance Tess studied the girl a moment. How pretty her gown was!
"Andy," she breathed, bending over him. "Oh, Andy, darling! Ye're telling me Jesus can keep me from bein' sent to that awful place? Ain't that what ye're tryin' to show me?" The dwarf scrambled up, reaching forth his hands. "And he sure can, brat," he made answer. "Waldstricker can't pull ye out of this hut when God's holdin' ye in." Andy was smiling his rare, boyish smile.
She's already borrowed a lot of Waldstricker and ... even our lake place is mortgaged to him. His sister loves me " The speaker felt the slender body recoil as from a blow. "Tess!" he cried, "I don't love her. Oh, can't I get you to understand anything? If you tremble that way, you'll drive me mad. I'm only going to marry her.... Well, to pay the money, that's all."
Her hair, copper-colored in the light from the window at her side, framed in its shining curls a face rapt and absorbed. Waldstricker leaned forward again, the better to see the rising steam wraiths. "I see all ye love best sufferin'." Letting the cane fall clattering to the floor, Mother Moll continued, doubled-fists outstretched to the man before her.
How to save the little one and protect Tess he couldn't guess. Casting frightened eyes first on the girl, then on the silent child, he crouched against the wall. "What ye goin' to do with 'er?" he mumbled at last.... "What's the whip for?" "I don't know yet," replied Tess, and she balanced the raw-hide in her hand. "This is the whip Waldstricker used.... Jake says to beat 'er like he beat Boy."
The prison-pallor of the squatter's face and hands and the ill-fitting, cheap prison clothes on his big body made him conspicuous among the men on the street. Waldstricker pulled up his team. "Sandy," he called, "come to the office when you're uptown. I want to see you." An hour or so later, the squatter slouched into Waldstricker's private room. The elder rose and greeted him.
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