Also it served to prevent him from breaking out.

But when he did break out, Bess Catton alone could deal with him.

Naturally it would be thought that there was some mutual attraction between these young people.

Yet this was not so, at any rate on the part of the girl, who had been overheard to tell Anthony to his face that she hated the sight of him and "would cut him to ribbons" if she were his mother.
At any rate, there were others, or one other, of whom Bess did not hate the sight, and in the end her behaviour caused such scandal that Barbara was obliged to send her out of the house.
"All right, ma'am," she said, "I'll go, and be glad of a change.

You may ring your own bull-calf now and I wish you joy of the job, since there's none but me that can lead him." A few days later Anthony returned from school.