He had not treated her badly.  He had not parted her from the old servant under whose escort she had travelled.  Perhaps he felt he would have other opportunities of avenging this insult to himself; perhaps there was something in the light in Joan’s eyes and in the way in which she sometimes placed her hand upon the hilt of the dagger in her belt which warned him not to try her too far.  Joan was something of an enigma to him still.  She was like no other woman with whom he had ever come in contact.  He did not feel certain what she might say or do.  It was rather like treading upon the crust of some volcanic crater to have dealings with her.  At any moment something quite unforeseen might take place, and cause a complete upheaval of all his plans.  From policy, as well as from his professed love, he had shown himself very guarded during the days of their journey and her subsequent residence beneath the roof of Basildene; but neither this show of submission and tenderness, nor thinly-veiled threats and menaces, had sufficed to bend her will to his.  It had now come to this —­ marry him of her own free will she would not.  Therefore the father must be summoned, and with him the priest, and the ceremony should be gone through with or without the consent of the lady.  Such marriages were not so very unusual in days when daughters were looked upon as mere chattels to be disposed of as their parents or guardians desired.  It was usual, indeed, to marry them off at an earlier age, when reluctance had not developed into actual resistance; but still it could be done easily enough whatever the lady might say or do.

Peter Sanghurst, confident that the game was now entirely in his own hands, could even afford to be indulgent and patient.  In days to come he would be amply avenged for all the slights now inflicted upon him.  He often pictured the moment when he should tell to Joan the true story of his possession of the love token she had bestowed upon Raymond.  He thought that she would suffer even more in the hearing of it than he had done upon the rack; and his wife could not escape him as his other victim had.  He could wring her heartstrings as he had hoped to wring the nerves of Raymond’s sensitive frame, and none could deliver her out of his hand.

But now he was still playing the farce of the suppliant lover, guessing all the while that she knew as well as he what a farce the part was.  He strove to make her surrender, but was met by an invincible firmness.

“Do what you will, Peter Sanghurst,” she said:  “summon my father, call the priest, do what you will, your wife I will never be.  I have told you so before; I tell it you again.”

He smiled a smile more terrible than his frown.

“We shall see about that,” was his reply, as he turned on his heel and strode from the room.

When he was gone Joan turned suddenly towards the old man, who was all this while standing with folded arms in a distant window, listening in perfect silence to the dialogue.  She made a few swift paces towards him and looked into his troubled face.