“You don’t need to know anything about the paper,” said Sheldon. “We tell you that the girl got a sworn paper from Mammy an’ Mammy’s out of her head an’ she talks too much. She don’t know what she’s sayin’, but a sworn lie holds for the truth.” He leaned forward and laid a scrap of paper on Herbert’s knee. “You tell her that you’re here an’ that you’re safe, an’ that she shall send the paper, then by morning you can go.” “I can’t make her send it.” Sheldon laughed. “She’ll send it to get her baby boy!” said he. The insulting words brought Herbert to his feet. “She won’t do anything of the kind. She’s gone for help, long ago, I can tell you that. Do you think she’ll sit down there and do nothing? You don’t know her! We were told that the instant you gave us any trouble we could have the constabulary come up here. They’ll wipe you out! They’ve got your deeds recorded! They’ll punish you for the present and the past.” A dark figure appeared in the faint speckled circle of lamplight. “I told you so!” said the woman’s voice, which Herbert had heard before. “Destruction is waiting for us! Destruction from our airless lives, according to the nurse, and destruction from the guns of the soldiers.” Sheldon rose muttering. “Git out of here, Jinny!” The woman moved backward. “She’s exactly right,” said Herbert. “One of you has sense, anyhow!” But Jinny’s tirade was not taken seriously by her kinsfolk. Sheldon returned and sat down heavily. “You don’t suppose, boy, that we left her free to run round over the country, do you?” Herbert shivered. Was a gun-barrel pointed also at Elizabeth? Nevertheless, he did not believe that she would follow the dictation of any gun-barrel. He saw the desperation of these outlaws on one side and Elizabeth’s indifference to danger and her anger at injustice on the other. There was also another element. Elizabeth would be wild with fear for him. At that thought Herbert’s cheeks reddened in the darkness. She would not expect him to be able to help himself! “Write what we tell you,” said Sheldon, tapping him on the knee. Herbert glanced down at the paper. The dark night, which seemed actually to press down upon him, the encircling men, the den behind him, the ferocious dogs lurking in the shadow--he was acutely conscious of all. He had always been taken care of by Elizabeth, and now he saw the words formed by his hand, “For my sake, Elizabeth, send them whatever paper you have!” But what paper was it? Why had she not told him about it? She had no business to keep him in ignorance! What motive could she have had?