"Then don't think and don't talk," said Bella, kindly placing a plump cushion at his back. "Rest quietly and I'll make you a cup of tea."
"You give me good for evil," said the preacher, flushing painfully.
"No, no!" replied the girl hastily, and remembering her share in his trouble. "You did me great honour in asking me to be your wife, though you were a trifle difficult in some ways. But now----"
"It is all gone; it is all gone. I assure you it is all gone!"
"All my love for you; all my desire; all my mad infatuation. I like you as a friend, Miss Faith--I shall always like you as a friend--but I can never, never worship you again in the way I did."
"Thank heaven for that!" said Bella fervently. She knew no more than did Silas how the change had come about. But it was evident that the blow on his head had suddenly rearranged his ideas.
"Up to ten o'clock last night I loved you madly, despairingly, and would have risked my soul to gain your hand. But since I fell"--he passed his hand across his forehead in a bewildered manner--"everything has changed."
"And for the better," Bella assured him. "Come, don't think anything more about the matter. I have rung the bell for tea."
"I rung the bell also last night. It brought in Mrs. Queen, very fortunately, or I might have bled to death, Miss Faith."
"Why do you call me Miss Faith?" asked Bella abruptly.
"Because you are Miss Faith," said the preacher, lifting his haggard face to her own in some surprise. "Did not the black man tell you?"
"How do you know that I have anything to do with the black man?"
"I have seen Mr. Lister with him. I saw you all three talking on the common. Oh, Miss Faith, you don't know how I have followed and spied on you!" and the man flushed with shame and dismay.
"No; I did not fall so low as that, but I followed and watched."
"Because I loved you. That is all over now; I shall never follow or watch you again. I am glad that the black man threw me down last night. When I found this morning that my prayers had been answered and that I no longer suffered from this mad passion, I resolved to say nothing about what had taken place."
"And so invented the story of the epileptic fit?"
"I know the truth: Durgo told everything to me and to Mr. Lister this morning, or rather this afternoon; also Durgo gave me the papers. I have read them, and know that I am not Captain Huxham's daughter. By the way"--Bella looked sharply at the preacher--"are we friends?"