Thou answerest not, Dudley!" exclaimed Ruth, taking the alarm, and
laying a hand firmly on the shoulder of him she questioned, as, forcing
his half-averted face to meet her eye, she seemed to read his soul.
The muscles of the sun-burnt and strong features of the borderer worked
involuntarily, his broad chest swelled to its utmost expansion, big
burning drops rolled out upon his brown cheeks, and then, taking the arm
of Ruth in one of his own powerful hands, he compelled her to release her
hold, with a firm but respectful exercise of his strength; and, thrusting
the form of his own wife, without ceremony, aside, he passed through the
circle, and entered the dwelling, with the tread of a giant.
The head of Ruth dropped upon her bosom, the paleness again came over
her cheeks, and it was then that the inward look of the eye might first
be seen, which afterwards became so constant and so painful an
expression in her countenance. From that hour, to the time in which the
family of the Wish-Ton-Wish is again brought immediately before the
reader, no further rumors were ever heard, to lessen or increase the
wasting regrets of her bosom.
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