Part 67 (1/2)
Deep groans came between the kisses he thrust upon her.
A moment later the sound of advancing steps lifted Frederick's face from hers. Muttering an oath, he threw Tess forcibly from him, for there in the path was Ebenezer Waldstricker, about whose sagging lips played a supercilious smile.
”So I was not mistaken,” he sneered, looking his brother-in-law full in the face. ”If Madelene doesn't care, I do.”
”Well?” growled Frederick. ”You've found me here, now do what you cursed want to, I don't care.”
”Perhaps you'll care before I finish,” said the elder grimly, and he included the girl in his baleful glare. ”I think you both will.”
Tessibel's mind flew to Boy. What could these two men do to her darling?
She went forward toward Waldstricker, her eyes raised appealingly to his.
”Won't you make Mr.... Mr. Graves keep away?” she pet.i.tioned. ”I don't want him here.”
”Yes, it looked, when I came around the corner, as if you didn't want him, miss,” scoffed the elder. Then he laughed, and the laugh cut the throbbing girl to the quick. ”Very much as if you wanted him to go....
Now, then, sir, what's this girl to you?”
”I'm nothing to him, Mr. Waldstricker,” she a.s.serted, without giving Frederick a chance to speak.
Graves still felt that maddening pa.s.sion, that demand for his own.
”She lies,” he said in low tones.
Tess turned to him pa.s.sionately.
”You know what I say is true. You came here without my desiring it! I don't want anything to do with you.... Haven't you both harmed me enough?... Do I ever come around and hurt you?... Why don't you tell the truth?”
”All right,” he shouted, his irritation at her resistance overcoming his fear of the elder. ”If you want the truth, here it is. I'm----”
”Don't! Don't!” screamed Tess.
”Ah!” hissed Waldstricker's lips like a jet of steam.
He'd caught within his powerful net the girl he wanted. He'd bring to light the secret that'd preyed upon his sister's spirits so long. For the squatter girl he felt no pity, for Frederick only contempt. They were both weaklings that he'd sweep away in his pursuit of Young and the squatters.
”He's sick,” said Tessibel, trying to discount Frederick's confession.
”Your brother-in-law's sick. You can see that!... He thinks ... why, he's mad!”
”I'm not mad!” Frederick turned upon her fiercely, then back to the big man whose eagerness bent him forward. ”I'm the father of her boy.”
The blood left Waldstricker's face, so that it looked like carved marble.
”So 'tis so,” he got out, ”and you admit it, you cur, and you dared to marry my sister? Now, as G.o.d lets me live, you'll both suffer for this, and as for you, Tessibel Skinner, look out for that b.a.s.t.a.r.d of yours!”
The squatter girl uttered a heart-broken cry, and turning, fled around the rocks into the lane and up the hill.
CHAPTER XLII