“Good God, Adam, let me alone!” Arthur burst out impetuously; “I feel it enough without your worrying me.”

He was aware of his indiscretion as soon as the words had escaped him.

“Well, then, if you feel it,” Adam rejoined, eagerly; “if you feel as you may ha’ put false notions into her mind, and made her believe as you loved her, when all the while you meant nothing, I’ve this demand to make of you—­I’m not speaking for myself, but for her.  I ask you t’ undeceive her before you go away.  Y’aren’t going away for ever, and if you leave her behind with a notion in her head o’ your feeling about her the same as she feels about you, she’ll be hankering after you, and the mischief may get worse.  It may be a smart to her now, but it’ll save her pain i’ th’ end.  I ask you to write a letter—­you may trust to my seeing as she gets it.  Tell her the truth, and take blame to yourself for behaving as you’d no right to do to a young woman as isn’t your equal.  I speak plain, sir, but I can’t speak any other way.  There’s nobody can take care o’ Hetty in this thing but me.”

“I can do what I think needful in the matter,” said Arthur, more and more irritated by mingled distress and perplexity, “without giving promises to you.  I shall take what measures I think proper.”

“No,” said Adam, in an abrupt decided tone, “that won’t do.  I must know what ground I’m treading on.  I must be safe as you’ve put an end to what ought never to ha’ been begun.  I don’t forget what’s owing to you as a gentleman, but in this thing we’re man and man, and I can’t give up.”

There was no answer for some moments.  Then Arthur said, “I’ll see you to-morrow.  I can bear no more now; I’m ill.”  He rose as he spoke, and reached his cap, as if intending to go.

“You won’t see her again!” Adam exclaimed, with a flash of recurring anger and suspicion, moving towards the door and placing his back against it.  “Either tell me she can never be my wife—­tell me you’ve been lying—­or else promise me what I’ve said.”

Adam, uttering this alternative, stood like a terrible fate before Arthur, who had moved forward a step or two, and now stopped, faint, shaken, sick in mind and body.  It seemed long to both of them—­that inward struggle of Arthur’s—­before he said, feebly, “I promise; let me go.”

Adam moved away from the door and opened it, but when Arthur reached the step, he stopped again and leaned against the door-post.

“You’re not well enough to walk alone, sir,” said Adam.  “Take my arm again.”

Arthur made no answer, and presently walked on, Adam following.  But, after a few steps, he stood still again, and said, coldly, “I believe I must trouble you.  It’s getting late now, and there may be an alarm set up about me at home.”

Adam gave his arm, and they walked on without uttering a word, till they came where the basket and the tools lay.

“I must pick up the tools, sir,” Adam said.  “They’re my brother’s.  I doubt they’ll be rusted.  If you’ll please to wait a minute.”