Odiam had triumphed at last. Just when Reuben's unsettled allegiance should have been given entirely to the wife who had borne him a son, his farm had suddenly snatched from him all his thought, all his care, his love, and his anxiety, all that should have been hers. It seemed almost as if some malignant spirit had controlled events, and for Rose's stroke prepared a counter-stroke that should effectually drive her off the field. The same evening that Rose had gone weeping and shuddering upstairs, Reuben had interviewed the vet. from Rye and heard him say "excema epizootica." This had not conveyed much, so the vet. had translated brutally:
"I dare notlet me go! Is he not excommunicated? has he not lived on in sin? Let me go."Reuben treated these irreverences with scorn. Nothing would make him abate a jot of his dignity. On the contrary, his manner and his presence became more and more commanding. He drove a splendid blood mare in his gig, smoked cigars instead of pipes, and wore stand-up collars about four inches highwhen he was not working, for it had not struck him that it was undignified to work, and he still worked harder on his farm than the worst-paid pig-boy.
THREE:"But I ?un'tyesterday I wur fair crying and sobbing in front of all the children. In the kitchen, it wurafter supperI put down my head on the table, and"It was like a muddled dreampeople seemed to have no reason for what they did or shouted; they just ebbed and flowed, jostled and jambed, ran hither and thither, sang and laughed and swore. Rose looked round her to see if she could recognise anyone; now and then a face glowed on her in the torch-light, then died away, once she thought she saw the back of a tradesman's daughter whom she knewbut her chief feeling was of[Pg 309] an utter isolation with her loved one, as if he and she stood alone on some sea-pounded island against which the tides of the world roared in vain.
"What dost thou here, John Kirkby, and why these screams?""Oh, clothes and things.""Two boys!not want two boys!Why, we want ten boys! if I cud have twenty, I shudn't grumble."
