and she raised her hand as if she would have struck again had Burr
Gordon and his false lips been there.

Her father looked at her gloomily, then strode on with his eyes on
the snowy ground. He was still in doubt. David Hautville had that
primitive order of mind which distrusts and holds in contempt that
which it cannot clearly comprehend, and he could not comprehend
womankind. His sons were to him as words of one syllable in straight
lines; his daughter was written in compound and involved sentences,
as her mother had been before her. Fond and proud of Madelon as he
was, and in spite of his stern anxiety, her word had not the weight
with him that one of his son's would have had. It was as if he had
visions of endless twistings and complexities which might give it the
lie, and rob it, at all events, of its direct force.

Indeed, Madelon strengthened this doubt by crying out passionately
all at once, as they went on: "Father, you must believe me! I tell
you I did it! I--don't let them hang him! Father!" All Madelon's
proud fierceness was gone for a moment. She looked up at her father,
choking with great sobs.

David smiled down at her convulsed face. "She's nothing but a woman,"
he thought to himself, and he thought also, with a throb of angry
relief, that she had not killed Lot Gordon. "Come along home and red
up the house, and let's have no more fooling," he said, roughly, and
strode on faster and would not say another word, although Madelon
besought him hard to assure her that he believed her, and that Burr
should not be hanged, until they reached the Hautville house. Then he
turned on her and said, with keen sarcasm that stung more than a
whip-lash, "'Tis Parson Fair's daughter and not mine that should come