I could scarcely go on refusing after this; and I really felt so tired and faint, that I doubted my capability of walking back to this house without resting.

So I said yes, and we went into Wyncomb Farmhouse.
The door was opened by a girl when my father knocked.

There was no one at home, she told him; but we were quite welcome to sit down in the parlour, and she would bring me a glass of fresh milk and a slice of bread-and-butter.
"The house had a strange empty look, I thought.

There was none of the life or bustle one expects to see at a farm; all was silent as the grave.
The gloom and quietness of the place chilled me somehow.

There was a fire burning in the parlour, and my father made me sit down very close to it, and I think the heat increased that faintness which I had felt when I came into the house.
"Again and again he urged his first demand, seeming as if he would wear down all opposition by persistence.