"Why should you defy me or fear me?
What have I done to you, what have I done to any one," she continued, with noble resentment, "that you should spread this of me?
You have eaten and drunk at my hand a hundred times; have I poisoned or injured you?
I have looked at you a hundred times; have I overlooked you?
You have lain down under this roof by night a hundred times; have I harmed you sleeping or waking, full moon or no moon ?" For answer he leered at her slyly.

"Not a whit," he said.

"No." "No ?" Her colour rose.
"No; but you see"-- with a grin--"it never leaves me, my girl." He touched his breast.

"While I wear that I am safe." She gasped.

"Do you mean that I----" "I do not know what you would have done--but for that!" he retorted.
"Maimed me or wizened me, perhaps! Or, may be, made me waste away as you did the child that died three doors away last Sunday!" Her face changed slowly.