The old man started and moved towards her, eagerly, his keen eyes breaking through the film that at times obscured them. “’Merrikan! tha baist ’Merrikan?  Then tha knaws ma son John, ’ee war nowt but a bairn when brether Dick took un to ’Merriky!  Naw!  Now! that wor fifty years sen!—­niver wroate to his old feyther—­niver coomed back, ’Ee wor tall-loike, an’ thea said ’e feavored mea.”  He stopped, threw up his head, and with his skinny fingers drew back his long, straggling locks from his sunken cheeks, and stared in her face.  The quick transition of fascination, repulsion, shock, and indefinable apprehension made her laugh hysterically.  To her terror he joined in it, and eagerly clasped her wrists.  “Eh, lass! tha knaws John—­tha coomes from un to ole grandfeyther.  Who-rr-u!  Eay! but tha tho’t to fool mea, did tha, lass?  Whoy, I knoawed tha voice, for a’ tha foine peacock feathers.  So tha be John’s gell coom from Ameriky.  Dear! a dear!  Coom neaur, lass! let’s see what tha’s loike.  Eh, but thou’lt kiss tha grandfather, sewerly?”

A wild terror and undefined consternation had completely overpowered her!  But she made a desperate effort to free her wrists, and burst out madly:—­

“Let me go!  How dare you!  I don’t know you or yours!  I’m nothing to you or your kin!  My name is Desborough—­do you understand—­do you hear me, Mr. Debs?—­Desborough!”

At the word the old man’s fingers stiffened like steel around her wrists, as he turned upon her a hard, invincible face.

“So thou’lt call thissen Des-borough, wilt tha?  Let me tell tha, then, that ‘Debs,’ ‘Debban,’ ‘Debbrook,’ and ‘Des-borough’ are all a seame!  Ay! thy feyther and thy feyther’s feyther!  Thou’lt be a Des-borough, will tha?  Dang tha! and look doon on tha kin, and dress thissen in silks o’ shame!  Tell ’ee thou’rt an ass, gell!  Don’t tha hear?  An ass! for all tha bean John’s bairn!  An ass! that’s what tha beast!”

With flashing eyes and burning cheeks she made one more supreme effort, lifting her arms, freeing her wrists, and throwing the old man staggering from her.  Then she leaped the stile, turned, and fled through the rain.  But before she reached the end of the field she stopped!  She had freed herself—­she was stronger than he—­what had she to fear?  He was crazy!  Yes, he must be crazy, and he had insulted her, but he was an old man—­and God knows what!  Her heart was beating rapidly, her breath was hurried, but she ran back to the stile.

He was not there.  The field sloped away on either side of it.  But she could distinguish nothing in the pouring rain above the wind-swept meadow.  He must have gone home.  Relieved for a moment she turned and hurried on towards the Priory.