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CHAPTER XI
THE DECLARATION OF WAR

For three weeks after that Sunday visit to Jake's home, life went on as usual, and a certain measure of tranquillity returned to Maud.

She found herself able to meet the man without any show of embarrassment, and, finding him absolutely normal in his behaviour towards her, she began to feel a greater confidence in his presence. He had promised that he would not force himself upon her, and it was evident that he had every intention of keeping his word. That he might by imperceptible degrees draw nearer to her, become more intimate, was a possibility that for a time troubled her; but he was so absolutely considerate in all his dealings with her that this fear of hers at length died away. If he were playing a waiting game he did it with a patience so consummate that his tactics were wholly hidden from her. He had to all appearances accepted her decision as final, and put the notion away as impracticable.

Christmas was drawing near, and several visitors had already arrived. There was generally a short season at Christmas, during which the Anchor Hotel had its regular patrons. Its landlord was in an extremely variable state of mind, sometimes aggressive, sometimes jovial, frequently not wholly sober. Maud avoided all contact with him with rigorous persistence, her mother's protests notwithstanding.

"He can't be civil to me," she said, "and he shall not have the opportunity of being anything else."

And no persuasion could move her from this attitude. Mrs. Sheppard was obliged reluctantly to abandon the attempt. She herself was seldom out of favour with her husband, whatever his condition, and that after all was what mattered most.

But the state of affairs was such as was almost bound to lead to a climax sooner or later. Giles Sheppard's hectoring mood was not of the sort to be satisfied for long with passive avoidance. Every glimpse he had of the girl, who ate his bread but disdained to do so in his company or the company of his friends, inflamed him the more hotly against her. It needed but a pretext to set his wrath ablaze, and a pretext was not far to seek.

One day about a week before Christmas he unexpectedly presented himself at the door of Bunny's room.

The weather was damp and raw, and a cheerful fire burned there. Bunny was lying among pillows on the sofa. He had had a bad night, and his face, as he turned it to the intruder, was white and drawn.

"What on earth-" he began querulously.

Sheppard entered with arrogance, leaving the door wide open behind him. "Look here!" he said harshly. "You've got to turn out of this. The room is wanted."

Maud, who was dusting the room as was her daily custom, turned swiftly round with something of the movement of a tigress. Her face was pale also. She had slept even less than Bunny the previous night. Her blue eyes shone like two flames under her knitted brows.

"What do you mean?" she said.

He looked at her with insult in his eyes. "I mean just that, my fine madam," he said. "This room is wanted. The boy will have to go with the rest of the lumber-at the top of the house."

It was brutally spoken, but the brutality was aimed at her, not Bunny. Maud realized that fact, and curbed her resentment. She could endure-or so she fancied-his personal hostility with fortitude. But his announcement was sufficiently disquieting in itself.

"I understood that we were not to be disturbed at any time," she said, meeting his look with that icy pride of hers that was the only weapon at her command. "Surely some other arrangement can be made?"

Sheppard growled out a strangled oath; she always made him feel at a disadvantage, this slip of a girl whom he could have picked up with one hand had he chosen.

"I tell you, this room is wanted," he reiterated stormily. "You'd better clear out at once."

"Bunny can't possibly be moved to-day," Maud said quickly and decidedly. "He is in pain. Can't you see for yourself how impossible it is? I am quite sure no visitor who knew the facts of the case would wish to turn him out."

Sheppard stamped a furious foot. He was getting up his fury; and suddenly she saw that he had been drinking. The knowledge came upon her in a flash of understanding, and with it a disgust so complete that it overwhelmed every other consideration.

She pointed to the door. "Go!" she said, in tense, frozen accents. "Go at once! How dare you come in here in this state?"

Before her withering disdain he drew back, as it were involuntarily. He even half turned to obey. Then, suddenly some devil prompted him, and he swung back again. With one gigantic stride he reached the sofa; and before either brother or sister knew what he intended to do he had roughly seized upon the boy's slight body and lifted it in his great arms.

Bunny's agonized outcry at the action mingled with his sister's, but it ceased almost immediately. He collapsed in the giant grip like an empty sack, and Sheppard, now wrought to a blind fury that had no thought for consequences, carried him from the room and along the passage to the stairs, utterly unheeding the fact that he had fainted.

Maud, nearly beside herself, went with him, striving to support the limp body where long experience had taught her support was needed. They went up the stairs so, flight after flight, Sheppard savage and stubborn, the girl in a dumb agony of anxiety, seeking only to relieve the dreadful strain that had bereft Bunny of his senses.

They reached at length a room at the top of the house, a bare garret of a place with sloping ceiling and uncarpeted floor. There was a bed under the skylight, and on this the man deposited his burden.

Then he turned and looked at Maud with eyes of cruel malevolence. "This is good enough for you and yours," he said.

Over Bunny's body she flung her fruitless defiance. "You drunken brute!" she said. "You loathsome coward! You hateful, tipsy bully!"

The words pierced him like the stabs of a dagger too swift to evade. He was sober enough to be cowed.

From the door he looked back at her, where she stood at the bedside, upright, quivering, a dart-like creature full of menace despite her delicacy of form and fibre. Again he knew himself to be at a disadvantage. He had not drunk enough to be intrepid. Swearing and malignant, he withdrew like a savage beast. But as he went, the madness of hatred rose in a swirl to his brain. She had defied him, had she? Her bitter words rang again and again in his ears. She had proclaimed him a drunkard, a coward, a bully! And she thought he would put up with it. Did she? Did she? Thought she could insult him with impunity in his own house! Thought he would tamely endure her impertinences for all time! He ground his teeth as he went down to the bar. He would have a reckoning with her presently. Yes, there should be a reckoning. He had borne with her too long-too long! Now matters had come to a head. She would either have to humble herself or go.

He had tried to be patient. He had hoped that Jake Bolton would soon relieve him of the unwelcome burden he had taken upon himself. Jake could tame her; he was quite sure of that. But Jake seemed to be making no headway. He had even begun to wonder lately if Jake meant business after all.

In any case he was at the end of his patience; and when his wife came to him with tears to remonstrate on behalf of poor little Bunny he hardened himself against her and refused to discuss the subject.

As for Maud, she spent the rest of the day in trying to make Bunny's new quarters habitable. She hoped with all her heart that Jake would come in the evening so that they could move him into the room she occupied, a floor lower, which had at least a fireplace. But for once Jake disappointed her, and so the whole day passed in severe pain for Bunny and vexation of spirit for her.

Towards evening to her relief he began to doze. She watched beside him anxiously. He had been very plucky, displaying an odd protective attitude towards herself that had gone to her heart; but she knew that at times he had suffered intensely and the fact had been almost more than she could bear. She knew that it would be days before he would shake off the effects of the rough handling he had received, and she dreaded the future with a foreboding that made her feel physically sick.

Now that Sheppard's animosity had developed into active hostility, she knew that the situation could not last much longer, but how to escape it remained a problem unsolved. Her uncle had made no reply to her letter. She could not write to him again. And there was no one else to whom she could appeal. Alone, she could have faced the world and somehow made a way for herself; but with Bunny- She clenched her hands in impotent anguish. There was only one person in the world willing to lift the burden from her, only one person besides herself who really cared for Bunny. She suddenly began to tremble. That sense of approaching doom was upon her again. The current had caught her surely, surely, and was whirling her away.

Bunny stirred-as though somehow caught in the net of her emotions-stirred and came out of uneasy slumber.

"I say, Maud!"

"What is it, darling? Are you uncomfortable?" There was a wealth of mother-love in her low voice as she bent above him.

Bunny put out a cold, moist hand. "I say, Maud," he said again, "Jake's a good sort. You like Jake, don't you?"

"Yes, darling," she answered soothingly.

He turned his head on the pillow; she could feel his fingers opening and closing in the restless way he had. "I like him too," he said. "I like him awfully. He's-the real thing. I wish-"

"What, Bunny?" There was constraint in her voice, and she knew it, but it was a subject upon which she could not bring herself to speak freely. She dreaded his answer more than she could have said.

Possibly he divined the fact, for he heaved a sharp sigh and said, "Nothing," in a tone that told her that he was very far from satisfied.

But she could not pursue the matter. Thankfully she let it drop.

The evening wore away. There was only one candle in the room. By it she and Bunny ate the supper which Maud herself had fetched from the kitchen. No one had time to wait upon them. The boy was still trying to make the best of things, and she marvelled at his courage.

When the meal was over he looked at her with a faint smile under his drawn brows. "Look here, Maud! There's that bed in the corner. Can't you make it comfortable and get a good night for once?"

She looked at him in surprise. It was very unusual for Bunny to give a thought to her comfort.

"Yes, I want you to," he said. "Go and undress, and then bring your blankets up here! You can't sit up all night in a straight-backed chair, so you may as well be comfortable. Don't stare! Go and do it!"

The bed in the corner was a thing of broken springs and crippled frame-work, but it had a mattress of straw albeit bedclothes were lacking. Bunny's suggestion seemed feasible, and since it was plain that he would not be content unless she followed it she yielded without demur. Her own room was only a flight of stairs away, and she had already fetched several things from it for his comfort. She hoped to get him down to it on the following day, if only Jake would come. It was neither warm nor spacious, but it was preferable to this fireless attic.

She brought the blankets, and arranged the bed. "I don't think I'll undress, Bunny," she said.

"You are to," said Bunny. "Jake says no one can possibly rest properly without."

She was inclined to resent this assertion of Jake's teaching, but again she yielded. Bunny was in a mood to work himself into a fever if his behests were not obeyed.

She went down and undressed therefore, and presently slipped up to him again, hoping to find him asleep. But he was wide-eyed and restless.

"It's so beastly cold," he said. "I can't sleep. My feet are like stones. Where's the fur rug?"

She looked round for it. "Oh, Bunny, I'm so sorry. I must have left it in your room downstairs. Never mind! Here's a blanket instead!"

She was already pulling it off her bed when Bunny asserted himself once more.

"Maud, I won't have it! I will not have it! Do you hear? Put it back again! Why can't you go and fetch the fur rug?"

"My dear, I can't go down like this," she objected.

"Rot!" said Bunny. "Everyone's gone to bed by now. If you don't get it, they'll be turning the room out in the morning, and it'll get lost. Besides, you look all right."

She was wearing no more than a light wrap over her night-dress; but, as Bunny said, it was probable that everyone had retired, for the hour was late. Only a few dim lights were left burning in the passages. There would be no one about, and it would not take two minutes to slip down and get the rug. She dropped the blanket he had refused, and went softly out.

CHAPTER XII
THE RECKONING

The whole house was in silence as noiselessly she stole down the stairs. It was close upon midnight, and she did not meet or hear anyone. The place might have been empty, so still was it.

The long, long roar of the sea came to her as she groped her way down the winding, dark passage that led to the room from which Bunny had been so rudely ejected a few hours before. There was no light here, but she knew her way perfectly, and, finding the door, softly opened it and turned on the electric light.

The room was just as she had left it, the sofa drawn up by the burnt-out fire. She had collected all Bunny's things earlier in the evening, but, since the rug had been forgotten, she thought it advisable to take the opportunity of ascertaining if anything else had been left behind. She found the rug, pushed the sofa back against the wall, and began a quiet search of all the drawers and other receptacles the room contained.

She had almost finished her task, and was just closing the writing-table drawer when a sudden sound made her start. A creaking footstep came from the passage beyond the open door. She turned swiftly with a jerking heart to see her step-father, bloated and malignant, standing on the threshold.

For a single instant he stood there looking at her, and a great throb of misgiving went through her at the savage triumph in his eyes. He had been drinking, drinking heavily she was sure; but he did not seem to be intoxicated, only horribly sure of himself, brutally free from any trammels of civilization. He closed the door with decision, and moved forward.

In the same moment she moved also towards the sofa over which she had thrown the rug she had come to fetch. Her heart was beating hard and fast, but she would not address a single word to him, would not so much as seem to see him. Supremely disdainful, she prepared to gather up her property and go.

But as she turned to the door she found him barring the way. He spoke, thickly yet not indistinctly.

"Not so fast, my fine madam! I've got to have a reckoning with you."

She drew herself up to the utmost of her slim height, and gave him a single brief glance of disgust. "Be good enough to let me pass!" she said, in tones of clear command.

But Sheppard did not move. He had been fortifying himself against any sudden strain such as this all day long.

"Not so fast!" he said again, with a gleam of teeth under his dark moustache. "You made a mistake this morning, young woman; a very big mistake. Don't make another to-night!"

Maud froze to an icier contempt. The steady courage of her must have shamed any man in his sober senses.

"Stand aside instantly," she said, "or I shall ring the bell and rouse the house!"

He laughed at that, a cruel, vindictive laugh. "Oh, you don't come over me that way! You mean to have your lesson, I see, and p'raps it's as well. It's been postponed too long already. There's a deal too much spirit about you, and too much lip too. You think I'll put up with anything, don't you? Think yourself much too high and mighty to associate with the likes of me? Think you can call me any darn' names you please, and I'll bear 'em like a lamb?"

His voice rose. Obviously his temper was already beyond control. He was in fact lashing it on to fury. Maud knew the process well.

It was enough for her, and she waited for no more. She stepped quietly to the bell.

She was nearer to it than he, and she did not for a moment imagine that he would dare to molest her. But she had not realized the maddened condition to which he had wrought himself; and even when he suddenly and violently strode forward she did not draw back or dream that he would touch her.

Only as his hand caught her outstretched arm did the knowledge that he was as utterly beyond control as a wild beast burst upon her. She uttered a desperate cry, and began a sharp, instinctive struggle to escape.

It was a very brief struggle, so taken by surprise and utterly unprepared was she. One moment she was fighting wildly for freedom; the next he had her at his mercy.

"Oh, you may scream!" he gibed. "No one will hear you! Now-do you know what I am going to do to you?"

"Let me go!" she panted, crimson and breathless.

He locked her two wrists together in one iron hand. His strength was utterly irresistible. She was as a pigmy in the grip of a giant.

"I'll let you go when I've done with you," he said, gloating openly over her quivering helplessness. "But first you will have your lesson. I'm going to give you the trouncing of your life!"

With the words he suddenly wrenched her round and forced her, almost flung her, face downwards over the sofa-head.

"You've been spoiling for this for a long time," he said, "and-being your step-father-I'll see that you get it. Never had a good spanking before in all your life, I daresay? Well, well see how you like this one!"

And therewith he pulled off one of his down-at-heel carpet slippers and proceeded to flog her with it, as if she had been a boy.

What she went through during that awful chastisement Maud never forgot. She fought at first like a mad creature till she was suddenly aware of the light wrap she wore ripping in all directions, and from that moment she resisted no more, standing passive in an agony of apprehension while he wreaked upon her all the pent malice of the past few weeks.

It was a brutal punishment, administered with the savage intention of breaking down the stark silence with which she sought to meet it. And even when he succeeded at last, even when the girl's strength went from her and she collapsed as he held her with a wild burst of hysterical crying and broken, unnerved entreaties, he did not stay his hand. Now was his grand opportunity for vengeance, and he might never get another. He did not spare her until he had inflicted the utmost of which he was capable.

Then at last roughly he set her free. "That's right! Blub away!" he jeered. "I've taken all the stiffening out of you at last, and a damn' good job too. P'raps you'll keep a civil tongue in your head for the future, and give me no more of your dratted impudence. There's nothing like a sound drubbing to bring a woman to her senses. But I don't advise you to qualify for another."

He put on his slipper, breathing somewhat heavily after his exertions, then stood up and wiped his forehead. His fury had exhausted itself. His mood had become one of semi-malicious elation.

He looked at the girl still crouched over the sofa-head, sobbing and convulsed, utterly broken, utterly conquered.

"Come!" he said. "Don't let us have any more nonsense! You won't give me any more of your airs after this, and we shall be all the better friends for it. Stand up and say you're sorry!"

She gasped and gasped again, but no words could she utter. The hateful callousness of the man could not so much as rouse her scorn. Her pride was in the dust.

He took her by the arm and pulled her roughly up, making her stand before him though she was scarcely capable of standing.

"Come!" he began again, and broke off with a brutal laugh, staring at her.

A flame of fierce humiliation went through her, burning her from head to foot as she realized that her night-dress had been rent open across her bosom. She caught it together in her trembling fingers, shrinking in an anguish of shame from the new devil that had begun to gibe at her out of his bloodshot eyes.

He laughed again. "Well, my fine madam, we seem to have pitched the proprieties overboard quite completely this time. All your own fault, you know. Serves you jolly well right. You aren't going to say you're sorry, eh? Well, well, I'd give you another spanking if I felt equal to it, but I don't. So I'll have the kiss of peace instead."

He caught her to him with the words, gripped her tightly round the body, tilted her head back; and for one unspeakable moment the heavy moustache was crushed suffocatingly upon her panting lips.

In that moment the strength of madness entered into Maud, such strength as was later wholly beyond her own comprehension. With frenzied force she resisted him, fighting as if for her very life, and so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that in sheer astonishment his grip relaxed.

It was her one chance of escape, and she seized it. With a single furious wrench she tore herself from him, not caring how she did it, found herself free, and fled, fled like a mad thing, panting, dishevelled, frantic, from the room.

His laugh of half-tipsy derision followed her, and all the devils of hatred, malice, and bitter cauterizing shame went with her as she fled.