"I'll bite," he said, "if you hit me!"
The time had been, and not many minutes since, when such a sight as
this would have wrung the Chemist's heart. He looked upon it now,
coldly; but with a heavy effort to remember something - he did not
know what - he asked the boy what he did there, and whence he came.
"Where's the woman?" he replied. "I want to find the woman."
"Who?"
"The woman. Her that brought me here, and set me by the large
fire. She was so long gone, that I went to look for her, and lost
myself. I don't want you. I want the woman."
He made a spring, so suddenly, to get away, that the dull sound of
his naked feet upon the floor was near the curtain, when Redlaw
caught him by his rags.
"Come! you let me go!" muttered the boy, struggling, and clenching
his teeth. "I've done nothing to you. Let me go, will you, to the
woman!"
"That is not the way. There is a nearer one," said Redlaw,
detaining him, in the same blank effort to remember some
association that ought, of right, to bear upon this monstrous
object. "What is your name?"
"Got none."
"Where do you live?
"Live! What's that?"
The boy shook his hair from his eyes to look at him for a moment,
and then, twisting round his legs and wrestling with him, broke
again into his repetition of "You let me go, will you? I want to
find the woman.
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