Was the woman a witch? Mary gazed at her with eyes wide with fear, and the man and boy stood by with a cunning grin on their faces. "Seven years ago," the woman went on in a sing-song tone, "you was lost. Seven years ago you was found. Seven years you've lived with strangers, and now you've come to yer own people." What did she mean? These dirty, dark, evil-looking tramps her own people! Mary took courage and drew herself haughtily upright. "You're not my people," she said boldly. "I live at the vicarage, with Mr and Mrs Vallance. I must go back to the others--it's getting late." "Not so fast, my little queen," said the woman, still holding her hand and gazing at the palm. "What's this 'ere little token I ketch sight on? Why, it's a little shoe! A little leather shoe with a row o' brass nails an' a brass toe. Now, by that 'ere token I know you belongs to us. Yonder's yer father, and yonder's yer brother; nobody and nothin' can't take you from us now." Mary burst into tears. It was too dreadful to find that this woman knew all about her; was it possible that she belonged to her in any way? "I can't stay with you," she sobbed, "I must go back. They wouldn't let you keep me if they knew." "They couldn't help it," said the woman with a scornful laugh, "not all the parsons and squires as ever was couldn't." Poor Mary! All her spirit had gone from her now, she stood helplessly crying in the middle of the room. "Wouldn't yer like to come back to pore Seraminta, yer own mother, what brought yer up and took care on yer?" the woman said in coaxing tones, "an to father Perrin, and dear brother Bennie." "No--no--no," sobbed Mary, "I must go home." "Well, now," said the woman, with a side wink to the two men, "suppose we _was_ to go agen our nateral feelin's and let you go back, what would you promise to do in return?" "Anything--I'll do anything," said Mary, checking her tears and looking up with a gleam of hope. "Then, look you here," said Seraminta, changing her soft tone to a threatening one, and frowning darkly. "First you've got to promise not to tell a soul of yer havin' bin in this room an' how you got 'ere. Next, to keep a quiet tongue about what you heard us say; and last, to bring all the money you've got and put it under the flat stone where the four roads meet, to-morrow at six o'clock in the evening. An' if yer do all these things we'll let you bide at the parson's. But if you breathe a word about what you've seen an' heard, whether it's in the dark or the light, whether it's sleeping or waking, whether it's to man, woman, or child, that very minute you'll be claimed for ours, and ours you'll be for ever." The room was getting dark by this time, and the fire burning low gave a sudden flicker now and then, and died down again; by this uncertain light the dark figures standing round, and the lowering frown on Seraminta's crafty face, looked doubly awful.