“Sit down, then,” he said.

“I can’t; I have to study.”

Something in the girl’s tones brought a low laugh from Everett.  He came closer to her.

“You’re a deliciously pretty child,” he bantered.  “Won’t you take hold of my hands?”

Placing her arms behind her, Flea answered: 

“No, I don’t like ye!” She backed far from him, her eyes burning with anger.

“You’re a very frank little maid, as well as pretty,” drawled Everett.  “Ever since I first saw you as a girl, I’ve wanted to know something about you.  Who’s your father?”

“None of yer business!” snapped Flea.

“Frank again,” laughed the lawyer ruefully.  “Now, honestly, wouldn’t you like to be friends with me?”

“No!  I said I didn’t like ye, and I don’t!  I want to go now.  You can sit here alone until Sister Ann comes.”

She looked so tantalizingly lovely, so lithely young, as she flung the disagreeable words at him, that Brimbecomb impulsively made a step toward her.  He was unused to such treatment and manners.  That this girl, sprung from some unknown corner, dared to flaunt her dislike in his face, made him only the more determined to conquer her.

“If I wait until Sister Ann comes,” he said coolly, “I shall not wait alone.  I insist that you stay here with me!”

“I have to go back to my brother.  So let me go by—­please!”

Fledra made an effort to pass Brimbecomb; but he grasped her deliberately in his arms.  Drawing her forcibly to him, he exclaimed: 

“I’ve caught my pretty bird!  Now I’m going to kiss you!”

Flea’s mind flashed back to the day when Lem Crabbe had tried to kiss her, and the thought came to her mind that she could have borne that even better than this.  She squirmed about until her face was far below his arm, and muttered: 

“If you try to kiss me, I’ll dig a hole in yer mug!”

Half-mocking at the threat, half-inviting its fulfilment, Everett laughed.  Then, with all his strength, he forced Flea’s angry, crimsoned face up to his and closed his lips over her red mouth, kissing her again and again.  The girl struggled until she was free.  In an uncontrollable temper she thrust her hand to Everett’s face, and he felt her fingernails scrape his cheek.  He released her instantly, stepping back in a gasp of rage and surprise.

Pantingly the girl rubbed her lips with her sleeve.

“If Sister Ann weren’t a lovin’ ye,” she flashed at him, “I’d tell her how cussed mean ye be!  If ye ever try to kiss me again, I’ll tear yer eyes out, Mister!”

She was gone before he could stop her, and, like a young fury bounded into the presence of Flukey.

“I know why I hate that feller of Sister Ann’s,” she muttered; “’cause he’s bad—­he’s a damn dog!  That’s what he is!”

With a startled ejaculation, Floyd half-rose; but Ann’s step in the hall sent him back on the pillow gasping.