Page:The Bondman; A New Saga (IA bondmannewsaga00cain).djvu/31

 Stephen to hearken to her, for that was the wife he had brought home to revile his mother.

The old witch shed some crocodile tears, and Stephen lunged in between the women and with the back of his hand struck his wife across the face.

At that blow Rachel was silent for a moment, and then she turned upon her husband. "And so you have struck me—me—me," she cried. "Have you forgotten the death of Patriksen?"

The blow of her words was harder than the blow of her husband's hand. The man reeled before it, turned white, gasped for breath, then caught up his cap and fled out into the night.

Rachel in her dishonour there is now not much to tell, but the little that is left is the kernel of this history.

That night, amid the strain of strong emotions, she was brought to bed before her time was yet full. Her labour was hard, and long she lay between life and death, for the angel of hope did not pull with her. But before the sun shot its first yellow rays through the little skin-covered windows, a child was born to Rachel, and it was a boy. Little joy she found in it, and remembering its father's inhumanity, she turned her face from it to the wall, trying thereby to conquer the yearning that answered to its cry.

It was then for the first time since her lying-in that the old mother came to her. She had been out searching for Stephen, and had just come upon news of him.

"He has gone in an English ship," she cried. "He sailed last night, and I have lost him for ever."

And at that she leaned her quivering white face over the bed, and raised her clenched hand over Rachel's face.

"Son for son," she cried again. "May you lose your son, even as you have made me to lose mine."

The child seemed likely to answer to the impious prayer, for its little strength waned visibly. And in those first hours