“What?” Scott said, startled.

The boy looked at him, his green eyes shrewdly confiding.  “There’s been the devil of a row,” he said.  “The mater is furious with her.  She gave her a fearful licking last night to judge by the sounds.  Dinah was squealing like a rat.  Of course girls always do squeal when they’re hurt, but I fancy the mater must have hit a bit harder than usual.  And she’s burnt the whole of the trousseau too.  Dinah was so mighty proud of all her fine things.  She’d feel that, you know, pretty badly.”

“Damnation!” Scott said, and for the second time he spoke without his own volition.  He looked at Billy with that intense hot light in his eyes that had in it the whiteness of molten metal.  “Do you mean that?” he said.  “Do you actually mean that your mother flogged her—­flogged Dinah?”

Billy nodded.  “It’s just her way,” he explained half-apologetically.  “The mater is like that.  She’s rough and ready.  She’s always done it to Dinah, had a sort of down on her for some reason.  I guessed she meant business last night when I saw the dog-whip had gone out of the hall.  I wished afterwards I’d thought to hide it, for it’s rather a beastly implement.  But the mater’s a difficult woman to baulk.  And when she’s in that mood, it’s almost better to let her have her own way.  She’s sure to get it sooner or later, and a thing of that sort doesn’t improve with keeping.”

So spoke Billy with the philosophy of middle-aged youth, while the man beside him sat with clenched hands and faced the hateful vision of Dinah, the fairy-footed and gay of heart, writhing under that horrible and humiliating punishment.

He spoke at length, and some electricity within him made the animal under him fidget and prance, for he stirred neither hand nor foot.  “And you tell me Dinah has run away?”

“Yes, cleared out,” said Billy tersely.  “It was an idiotic thing to do, for the mater is downright savage this morning, and she’ll only give her another hiding for her pains.  She stayed away all day once before, years ago when she was a little kid, and, my eye, didn’t she catch it when she came back!  She never did it again—­till now.”

“And you are going to the station to look for her?” Scott’s voice was dead level.  He calmed the restive horse with a firm hand.

“Yes; just to find out if she’s gone by train.  I don’t believe she has, you know.  She’s nowhere to go to.  I expect she’s hiding up in the woods somewhere.  I shall scour the country afterwards; for the longer she stays away the worse it’ll be for her.  I’m sure of that,” said Billy uneasily.  “When the mater lays hands on her again, she’ll simply flay her.”

“She will not do anything of the sort,” said Scott, and turned his horse’s head with resolution.  “Come along and find her first!  I will deal with your mother afterwards.”

Billy mounted his bicycle and accompanied him.  Though he did not see how Scott was to prevent any further vengeance on his mother’s part, it was a considerable relief to feel that he had enlisted a champion on his sister’s behalf.  For he was genuinely troubled about her, although the cruel discipline to which she had been subjected all her life had so accustomed him to seeing her in trouble that it affected him less than if it had been a matter of less frequent occurrence.