"As God in heaven's my judge, he ban't no cheel of mine, and I knaw nothing about him--no, nor yet his faither nor mother nor plaace of birth. I found un wheer I said, and if I've lied by a fraction, may God choke me as I stand here afore you." "An' I believe you to the bottom!" declared his father-in-law. "I believe you as I hopes to be believed myself, when I stands afore the Open Books an' says I've tried to do my duty. You've got me on your side, an' that's to say you'll have Phoebe an' your mother, tu, for certain." Then Blanchard's mood changed, and there came a tremendous rebound from the tension of the last few minutes. In the anti-climax following upon his oath, passion, chained a while by astonishment, broke loose in a whirlwind. "Let 'em believe or disbelieve, who cares?" he thundered out. "Not me--not a curse for you or anybody, my awn blood or not my awn blood. To harbour lies against me! But women loves to believe bad most times." "Who said they believed it, Will? Doan't go mad, now 'tis awver and done." "They _did_ believe it; I knaw, I seed it in theer faaces, come to think of it. 'Tis the auld song. I caan't do no right. Course I've got childer an' ruined maids in every parish of the Moor! God damn theer lying, poisonous tongues, the lot of 'em! I'm sick of this rotten, lie-breeding hole, an' of purty near every sawl in it but mother. She never would think against me. An' me, so true to Phoebe as the honey-bee to his awn butt! I'll go--I'll get out of it--so help me, I will--to a clean land, 'mongst clean-thinking folk, wheer men deal fair and judge a chap by his works. For a thought I'd wring the neck of the blasted child, by God I would!" "He've done no wrong." "Nor me neither. I had no more hand in his getting than he had himself. Poor li'l brat; I'm sorry I spoke harsh of him. He was give me--he was give me--an' I wish to God he _was_ mine. Anyways he shaa'n't come to no harm. I'll fight the lot of 'e for un, till he 's auld enough to fight for hisself." Then Will burst out of Monks Barton and vanished. He passed far from the confines of the farm, roamed on to the high Moor, and nothing further was seen of him until the following day. Those most concerned assembled after his departure and heard the result of the interview. "Solemn as a minister he swore," explained Mr. Lyddon; "an' then, a'most before his hands was off the Book, he burst out like a screeching, ravin' hurricane. I half felt the oath was vain then, an' 't was his real nature bubblin' up like." They discussed the matter, all save Chris, who sat apart, silent and abstracted. Presently she rose and left them, and faced her own trouble single-handed, as she had similarly confronted greater sorrows in the past.