"I didn't know," said Susan to her uncle. "Nobody ever told me.
I thought we were engaged."
"A good woman don't need to be told," retorted Warham. "But I'm
not going to argue with you. You've got to marry."
"I couldn't do that," said the girl. "No, I couldn't."
"You'll either take him or you go back to Sutherland and I'll
have you locked up in the jail till you can be sent to the House
of Correction. You can take your choice."
Susan sat looking at her slim brown hands and interlacing her
long fingers. The jail! The House of Correction was dreadful
enough, for though she had never seen it she had heard what it
was for, what kind of boys and girls lived there. But the
jail--she had seen the jail, back behind the courthouse, with
its air of mystery and of horror. Not Hell itself seemed such a
frightful thing as that jail.
"Well--which do you choose?" said her uncle in a sharp voice.
The girl shivered. "I don't care what happens to me," she said,
and her voice was dull and sullen and hard.
"And it doesn't much matter," sneered Warham. Every time he
looked at her his anger flamed again at the outrage to his love,
his trust, his honor, and the impending danger of more
illegitimacy. "Marrying Jeb will give you a chance to reform and
be a good woman. He understands--so you needn't be afraid of
what he'll find out."
"I don't care what happens to me," the girl repeated in the same
monotonous voice.
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