Page:Hornung - Rogues March.djvu/229

Rh “Would it?” said Tom. “Well, never you fear, Peggy! “I’m not such a fool as all that, and I’ll give them no reason, you may depend.”

“They may be afther makin’ one, Tom dear; faith an’ they’d have one ready-made if they cot ye here! There’s the second bell. For God’s sake be off—an’ remimber Peggy’s words.”

“I’ll go when I’m ready, Peggy; not until; and don’t shut down that window, or you’ll take off my fingers. Your hand again! It’s to you I shall owe my whole skin!”

He gave her his hand; she took it between both of hers, and pressed it with a fervour that should have given him another warning on the spot. But her kind voice only put him in mind of Claire so far away: nor did he hear it again for some few days. Now and then she would wave to him from the kitchen window; but it was always to wave him back. More often he waved to her from the stable door; but she invariably shook her black head at him with the greatest vigour.

Meanwhile her words came true.

Mr. Nat had conceived a palpable spite against the new groom; and from things the latter heard in the convicts’ hut, where he went for his meals, he might have understood the reason; these same things making him the less eager to see very much more of Peggy the cook. Still he gave her a wave whenever he espied her in the distance, for he owed the girl much already: he was daily profiting by her good advice, since no day passed without its measure of wilful provocation from the ruffianly Nat. But Tom was not to be provoked by sneer or taunt or oath; moreover, he made an excellent groom, and being seen no more about the house, gave no further