Page:Cornelia Meigs--The windy hill.djvu/168

162 "So Jasper Peyton, having sent one of you to steal my picture, has lost courage and sent two of you to bring it back again. Very clever, very clever of him indeed!"

"He knew nothing about it," Janet was beginning passionately, when Oliver silenced her by a touch on her shoulder.

"He knows that," he reminded her calmly; "he is only trying to make you angry."

He caught a look of smoldering fury in Anthony Crawford's eye and a note of surprised irritation in his voice.

"Well," the man snapped, "am I to have my property or not?"

"You are to have it. We will not keep anything that you even claim as yours," returned Oliver.

He felt hot rage surging up within him, yet he strove to keep it down. He had realized, of a sudden, that this man who could hurt his Cousin Jasper so deeply, who could ruin John Massey, could harm neither him nor Janet in the least. Oliver had felt real dread as he came through the gate, he had been haunted by the vague terror of what Anthony Crawford might be able to do, but he looked upon him now with disillusioned eyes, knowing him for nothing but a small-minded, selfish, spiteful man whose power over them was nothing at all.

"If I can only keep as calm as he can, he will never get the better of me," the boy thought des-