Deborah began to speak again. She said:
“He turned and went out noiselessly, and the door made no sound as it closed behind him. I could hear the clock ticking somewhere. It was the first time I had heard one in that house, and somehow it made the night and the world real again. I could not sleep again. It was too much to expect. I lay there staring at the door for hours, and sure that there was somebody on the other side of it, somebody standing there with his head thrust forward and still eyes that grew as large as moons. It began to grow light, that skimmed-milk-like color that the early cloudy morning has, and I kept saying to myself, ‘I must go away from here. I mustn’t be found here in the morning.’ It was only by a terrific effort of will that I forced myself to get up and dress. I can’t tell you how blinded with panic I was when I pushed the door open. There was no one there. There wasn’t a sound in the house as I crept downstairs and out of the kitchen door. I reached the road and looked back at the house. It squatted there like a dead thing with blind eyes. It couldn’t see me. I began to run then. I ran all the way here. I thought I could hear things running after me, but when I looked back the road was empty. I even thought I heard someone laughing in the air. I came to you first because. …”
The door swung open and the small plump figure of Mrs. Slater appeared behind a breakfast tray. Her eyes opened with amazement when she saw the drooping figure of Deborah, but she said nothing until she methodically placed the tray on the table and removed the napkin from the food. Then she turned to the girl, a thin disapproval curling down her mouth.
“Land’s sakes,” she said in a querulous tone. “You’re in town early.”
Deborah gazed from her aunt to Dreeme, a mingled defiance and supplication in her blue eyes.
“I’ve run away,” she said. “I’m not going back. I won’t stay there.”
Mrs. Slater arranged the breakfast plates in a deliberate fashion. Her eyes fluttered as she moved about the table. She said:
“You can’t run away. Girls don’t run away in Marlborough.”
There was no interest in her voice, nothing but a faintly-aggrieved protest.
“She has run away,” remarked Dreeme shortly. “Can’t you see her in front of you?”
Mrs. Slater ignored him. In a voice entirely lacking in curiosity she inquired:
“What was the matter, Deborah?”
“I … I was frightened,” replied the girl. “I don’t like that awful place and those awful people.”
She stopped abruptly at that. Dreeme understood that she realized the impossibility of explaining anything to Mrs. Slater. He undertook to fill the gap.
“Deborah is a highly nervous girl,” he said. “It is necessary that she have surroundings that are favorable. A lonely farm and a brutal farmer who peers into one’s bedroom at night, and who is up to the devil knows what, are not the surroundings for her. Speaking as a doctor. …”
“Your coffee’s cooling,” said Mrs. Slater. She shifted the sugar-bowl uneasily. Dreeme poured a cup of coffee and handed it to Deborah.
“There’s plenty of breakfast in the house of your relations,” announced Mrs. Slater, the wan ghost of indignation in her voice.
“But not plenty of room,” added Dreeme. He sat down angrily to his breakfast, and proceeded to eat. Mrs. Slater stood looking at her niece.
“You know I would do for you,” she said, “but Walden has about all he can handle with the children. The land’s mighty poor.”
She ignored Dreeme completely. The young doctor visualized a picture of a stoop-shouldered man struggling all day with thin soil that noisy little mouths might be fed. He cultivated a stone and strove to make bread of it. Well, it was no circus. Still. …
“You can’t place Deborah where she is frightened and unhappy,” he said.
“Mrs. Westcott is the only neighbor around here who wants somebody,” remarked Mrs. Slater. There was a hopeless and dispirited note in her voice.
Neither Dreeme nor Deborah replied. Mrs. Slater stood by the table stolidly, her eyes fluttering.
“There’s nothing to be frightened of at the Westcott farm,” she added. “Nothing at all.”
Dreeme passed a slice of toast to Deborah. Curious. All his life. He knew she sat that way. Mrs. Slater moved closer to the table.
“I don’t see why you should be unhappy there,” she said. “I don’t see, at all.”
“Well, we’ll talk it over later,” interposed Dreeme. “Let Deborah recover her equanimity.”
“It’s hard on me,” said Mrs. Slater. She stooped to lift an empty plate, and tiny lines rippled across her plump face. It was sagging a bit now. The earth seemed pulling it downward. She was aggrieved at life in general and Deborah in particular. Dreeme she plainly regarded as an interloper, an officious stranger, who thrust himself into affairs that did not concern him. For an instant he was angry. It was hard on her! He opened his mouth to expostulate, even to deliver a long speech on her unkindly attitude, when a measured thumping sounded in the hall leading to the study. It was a rhythmical alternating sound, now loud and then soft, the sound of a man, perhaps, with a wooden leg. A man with a wooden leg or. … Before the door swung open Dreeme knew who it was. With calm eyes, therefore, he raised his face to Jeffrey Westcott who stood in the doorway. He said:
“Good morning. You are into town early.”
Westcott nodded slightly. His eyes were fastened on Deborah.
“You’re abroad early also,” he remarked to her. His voice was low and casual. The girl did
