Page:Mehalah 1920.djvu/188

178 "You shall be the mistress." "I do not want, I do not choose to be anything else in this house but your hired servant. Pay me a wage, and I will remain till I can find some other situation; refuse, and, if I have to leave my mother, I will go out of this house to-night." "If you leave your mother, I will throw her out." "I would fetch her away. I would carry her in my arms. I will not stay here on any other terms."

"I will humour you. You shall be paid. I will give you five shillings a week. Is that enough?" "More than enough, with my keep and that of my mother. I thank you now. In future speak of me to the men as their fellow-servant, and not as you did recently to Abraham as their mistress." "I shall speak to them as I like. Am I to be controlled by you?" "Then I will leave. I will carry my mother to the inn at Salcot, and rest there till I can find some other shelter." "Now look here. Glory," said Elijah. He put his gun aside, and leaned his elbows on his knees, and faced her. "It is of no use your talking of running away from me. You may run, but I can draw you back. I sit here of a night brooding over my fire, I begin thinking of you. I think, I think, and then a spirit takes me as it were, and fills me with fierce will, to bring you here. I feel I have threads at every finger and threads to my knees and to my feet, all fast to you, and if I stir, I move you. I lift my finger, and you raise yours. I wave my hand up, and you throw up yours. You don't know it. I do. I know that I have but to rise up from my chair, and I lift you up wherever you may be, in your bed, in your grave, and then, if I draw in with my will, I wind up these threads, and you come, you come, from wheresoever you are, out of your bed in your smock, out of your grave in your shroud; doors are nothing, my will can burst them open; locks are naught, my will can wrench them, off; the screws in the coffin lid and five feet of earth are nothing, I could draw you through all. I could draw you over the ooze, and you would not be sucked in by it. I could draw you over the water, and you would not wet your foot. I could draw you through