Of late he had resumed his visits to Cheat Land, discontinued for a while at Tilly's marriage. The attraction of Alice Jury was as strong, unfathomable, and unaccountable as ever. Since the stormy interview after Richard's desertion they had not discussed his ambitions[Pg 238] for Odiam and Boarzell, but that meeting was none the less stamped on Reuben's memory with a gloomy significance. It was not that Alice's arguments had affected him at allshe had not penetrated to the springs of his enterprise, she had not touched or conjured the hidden part of him in which his ambition's roots were twined round all that was vital and sacred in the man. But somehow she had expressed her own attitude with an almost sinister clearness"It's I who am fighting Boarzell." What should she fight it for?imagine that she fought it, rather, for a woman could not really fight Boarzell. She was fighting it for him. She wanted him.When the doctor arrived an hour later, his services were needed after all. For Naomi gave birth to a little boy at dawn.Chapter 11
