In one of the secret places among the rocks Pendoggat waited, and Thomasine came to meet him there. She came because she had been told to, and about the only thing that her mind was capable of realising was that she must be obedient. Country girls have to do as they are told. They are nearly as defenceless as the rabbits, and any commoner may trap them as one of his rights. So Thomasine came down among the rocks. She had not been out with Will Pugsley lately, because it was not allowed. She wanted to, but Pendoggat had refused permission. He had indeed gone further, and had threatened to murder her if she went with any other man. Thomasine accepted the inevitable, and told her Will she could not go out with him any more. Pugsley, having saved a little money, desired to spend it upon matrimony, and as he could not have Thomasine he was going about looking for another maid. One would serve his purpose as well as another, so long as she had plenty of blood in her. Such a thing as love without lust was unknown to Pendoggat. His only idea of the great passion was to catch hold of a woman, maul her, enjoy her flesh, and her warmth, and the texture of her clothes; the coarse, crude passion which makes a man ruin himself, and destroy the life of another, for the pleasure of a moment's madness; that same anarchy of mind which has dethroned princes, lost kingdoms, and converted houses of religion into houses of ill-fame. Pendoggat would not have gone mad over Thomasine had she been merely pretty. It was that face of hers, the blood in her, something in the shape of her figure, which had kindled his fire. All men burn, more or less, and must submit; and when they do not it is because Nature is not striving very hard in them. Much is heard of the morality of Joseph; nothing concerning the age or ugliness of Potiphar's wife. These conventional old tales are wiped out by one touch of desire, and nothing remains except the overmastering thing. The trees cannot help budding in spring. Nature compels it, as she compels the desire of the human body also.