It was this power of taking an evident sensual satisfaction in such small luxuries as he was able to obtain that had alone attached Markham to his daughter.  His character belonged to a type found both among men and women; it was a nature entirely selfish and endowed with an instinctive art in working upon the unselfish sentiments of others—­an art which even creates unselfishness in other selfish beings.

“I came as soon as I could,” she said.  “I suppose you did not want me to put Toyner on your track.”

“Yee owe,” said the wretched man, stretching himself luxuriously.  “I’ve been a-standin’ up and a-sittin’ down and a-standin’ up since last night, an’——­” Here he suddenly remembered something.  He sat up and looked round fearfully.

“When it got dark before the moon came I saw the devil!  One!  I think there was half a dozen of them!  I saw them comin’ at me in the air.  I’d have gone mad if they hadn’t gone off when the moon rose.”

“Lie still, father, until I give you something to eat,” she said.

While she was unfastening her bundle, she looked about her, and saw how the spaces of shadow between the grey branches might easily seem to take solid form and weird shape to a brain that was fevered with excitement of crime and of flight and enforced vigil.  She had a painful thing to tell this man—­that she could not, as she had hoped, release him from his desperate prison that night; but she did not tell him until she had fed him first and given him drink too.  She insisted upon his taking the food first.  It was highly seasoned, beef with mustard upon it, and pickles.  All the while he watched her hand with thirsty eye.  When he had gulped his food to please her, she produced a small bottle.  He cursed her when he saw its size, but all the same he held out his hand for it eagerly and drank its contents, shutting his eyes with satisfaction and licking his lips.

All this time she was steadying the boat by holding on to a tree with a strong arm.

“Now it’s hard on you, father, but you’ll have to stay here another night.  Down at The Mills they’re watching for you, and it would be sure death for you to try and get through the swamp, even if I could take you in the boat to the edge anywhere.”

The man, who had been entirely absorbed with eating and drinking and stretching himself, now gave a low howl of anguish; then he struggled to his knees and shook his fist in her face.  “By ——­ I’ll throw you out of this ‘ere boat, I will; what do yer come tellin’ me such a thing as that for?  Don’t yer know I’d liefer die—­don’t yer know that?” He brought his fist nearer and nearer to her eyes.  “Don’t yer know that?”

It appeared that he would have struck her, but by a dexterous twist of her body and a pull upon the tree she jerked the boat so that he lost his balance, not entirely, but enough to make him right himself with care and sit down again, realising for the time being that it was she who was mistress of this question—­who should be thrown out of the boat and drowned.