Then Mary hardened her heart; for she guessed that George was choosing for his only visitor the widow woman from Lesswardine, whom she had seen at the trial. Re-reading George’s letter she burned with anger. What right had he to dictate to her how she should behave? Her soul was full of hatred and contempt, so that she almost wished that she had given him real cause for suspicion. In this state she allowed her memory to dwell with tenderness on the surprising moment that had come to her and Abner by the sea-crows’ pool. She felt that she had been foolish to shrink from it. And yet she dared not let Abner see what she was thinking; knowing for certain, that if she did so something violent and terrible must happen to them. For herself she had no fear; but the thought of what the children might suffer chilled her. And she released her surfeit of feeling in a more passionate devotion to these small creatures, determining, whatever might happen, to hold on for the remaining eight months of George’s imprisonment. This artificial resolution made her harden herself more than ever against Abner. One day Mrs Mamble brought her the news that Susan Hind was being married in less than a week to Badger, the keeper. She now saw so little of Abner that she could not be sure that his old relations with Susie had ceased, but she found herself snatching eagerly at an occasion for wounding him. ‘I hope you’re going to your old friend’s wedding, Abner,’ she said. ‘I don’t know nothing about one,’ he said. ‘I’ve no friends in these parts that I know to.’ ‘Susie Hind . . . she’s marrying Mr Badger next Monday.’ She watched him carefully. ‘Well, he’s welcome!’ said Abner, with a laugh. And then, instead of being relieved, she found herself overwhelmed by a new suspicion. He would not have spoken like that unless he had been entangled with some other woman. She wondered who it could be, and a few days later began to ply him with deliberate questions about Marion Prosser. He did not guess what she was driving at; imagined that she was still brooding over her old slight. ‘I know naught about her,’ he said. ‘Do you like her any better than you did?’ ‘I don’t mind her,’ said Abner. ‘At any rate she don’t werrit me with questions about you.’ One day in October Marion renewed her proposal that Abner should sleep at The Dyke. She told him that she didn’t like to think of him walking to and from Wolfpits every day. If she had substituted ‘Mary Malpas’ for ‘Wolfpits’ she would have been nearer to the truth. ‘We can make you quite comfortable in the little loft above the harness-room,’ she said. ‘There’s no point in your wearing yourself out.’ He said nothing; but told Mary of her proposal. Listening, she held her breath. ‘I don’t want to keep you,’ she compelled herself to say. ‘You’d better go.’ ‘No fear!’ said he. ‘You don’t catch me losing my liberty that way! A man that sleeps over his work’s no better than a slave.’