"Beasts! Pigs! A-a-a-ah!--You!"
The attendants had disappeared, the stranger was lost in shadows. There
was nobody there but themselves: it would not have mattered if there
had been: all the lords and ladies, all the swells in the world, would
not have mattered. The great empty hall, suddenly friendly, closed,
curving, around them.
Jenny dropped upon her knees at Ben's side, and flung her arms about
him, with little moans of love and pity; slid one hand beneath his
cheek, with a muffled roll of notes, raised his head and pressed it
against her heart.
"There, my dear! There, my love--there--there--there!"
She laid her lips to his thick dark hair, in a passion of adoration,
loving every lock of it; and then, woman-like, picked a white thread
from off his black coat; clasped him afresh, with joy and sorrow like
runnels of living water pouring through and through her.
"There, there, there, there!"
He was too much of a child to fight against her: all his pride was
gone. "Oh, Jenny, Jenny, Jenny!" he cried; then, in an extremity of
innocent anguish, amazement--
"They didn't come! They don't care--they don't want it! Jenny, they
don't want it!"
"Don't you worry about them there blighters, my darling.
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