"I air goin' to Daddy now," she whispered. "An' you can go home too, please." But he caught her again to his breast. "You belong to me!" he cried intensely. "I won't go!--I'm going to stay, Tessibel! I will--I will stay!" Tess wrenched herself free. "Ye c'n come again," she promised. "Some other time afore--" Frederick caught her broken sentence and finished it. "Yes, yes, Tessibel," he exclaimed. "I'll come back soon, very soon!" "Sure, soon," quivered Tess, swaying, "go on, please!" She flung up her hands, crying low in suppressed agony, as Frederick whirled from her and walked rapidly away. He had not taken ten steps before he was moved to go back, to take her again in his arms, but thinking over all that had happened, of how hard it had been to flounder through his explanation, he shut his teeth and went on. With super-hearing, Tess listened until the sound of his footsteps died in the lane. He had gone--Frederick--her husband! Gone to another woman! No, that couldn't be! He was hers always and forever. She sank down on the rocks--on the dear, ragged rocks, where she had watched for him and prayed for him, where life had been at its highest and best. She tried to recall all he had said. Oh, yes, he was coming back. What did he mean by coming back? When? She dully wondered if it would be tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after that. Three days, perhaps, three long, interminable days to think of him and to long for him. Could she live three days? She sprang to her feet. She must see him again--now--this minute; hear him unsay that awful thing. Why, he couldn't belong to Madelene Waldstricker! Like a deer, Tess sped along the rocks in the direction of the lane. A night bird brushed a slender wing against her curls as he shot by her. To him she paid no heed save to swerve a little. Wildly, twice, three times she cried, "Frederick!" An owl hooted a mocking response from the willow tree nearby. "Frederick! Frederick!" rang through the night, out over the lake, unanswered. He was gone! The realization of this brought the girl crouching, shivering to the shore, where her feet were lapped by the incoming waves. And there she lay, until as in a dream, a bewildered dream, she heard Daddy Skinner's voice calling her. By a supreme effort she gathered her senses together. "I air comin', Daddy." She stumbled through the night back to the shanty, her secret locked in her breast. CHAPTER XVII TESSIBEL'S PRAYER For four lingering days, hour after hour, Tess of the Storm Country waited for Frederick. He had promised to return, and so each day when her household duties were completed, she hastened to the ragged rocks at the edge of the forest. But her eager hope passed into sick apprehension as the lingering twilights of successive evenings deepened into the darkness of night and he did not come. Tess grew paler and more dejected, so that even Daddy Skinner's fading sight remarked it.