previous manner towards the reddleman as an underling. "Nobody has ever
been served so! It was going on well--I will not be beaten down--by an
inferior woman like her. It is very well for you to come and plead for
her, but is she not herself the cause of all her own trouble? Am I not
to show favour to any person I may choose without asking permission of a
parcel of cottagers? She has come between me and my inclination, and now
that she finds herself rightly punished she gets you to plead for her!"

"Indeed," said Venn earnestly, "she knows nothing whatever about it. It
is only I who ask you to give him up. It will be better for her and you
both. People will say bad things if they find out that a lady secretly
meets a man who has ill-used another woman."

"I have NOT injured her--he was mine before he was hers! He came
back--because--because he liked me best!" she said wildly. "But I lose
all self-respect in talking to you. What am I giving way to!"

"I can keep secrets," said Venn gently. "You need not fear. I am the
only man who knows of your meetings with him. There is but one thing
more to speak of, and then I will be gone. I heard you say to him that
you hated living here--that Egdon Heath was a jail to you."

"I did say so. There is a sort of beauty in the scenery, I know; but it
is a jail to me. The man you mention does not save me from that feeling,
though he lives here. I should have cared nothing for him had there been
a better person near."

The reddleman looked hopeful; after these words from her his third
attempt seemed promising. "As we have now opened our minds a bit, miss,"
he said, "I'll tell you what I have got to propose. Since I have taken