His return had been complete. All that she had ever had and lost of empire had re-established itself during that hour at Cheat Land. He wanted her as he had wanted her before he met Rose, but with a renewed intensity, for he was no longer mystified by his desire. He no longer asked himself how he could possibly love "a liddle stick of a woman like her," for he saw how utterly love-worthy she was and had always been. For the first time he saw as his, if only he would take it, a great woman's faithful love. This love of Alice Jury's had nothing akin to Naomi's poor little fluttering passion, or to Rose's fascination, half appetite, half[Pg 327] game. Someone loved him truly, strongly, purely, deeply, with a fire that could be extinguished only by death orhe realised in a dim wayher own will. The question was, should he pay the price this love demanded, take it to himself at the cost of the ambitions that had fed his life for forty years?"Oh Lord!" wailed Ditch"Oh Lord!"
ONE:"Mary Byles, how did this happen?" asked Calverley, eagerly.
TWO:She ran out of the house. Away on Boarzell a man plodded and stumbled. She saw him stagger as the wind battered him, reel and nearly fall among the treacheries of the dead heather. He was like a drunken man, and she knew that he was drunk with shame.
TWO:"Save yourself, f?ather," continued the evangelist, "and give up all the vain desires of the flesh. Is this a time to buy olive-yards and vineyards? Beware lest there c?ame upon you as it did to him wot purchaised a field, the reward of inquiety, and falling headlong he bust asunder in the midst and his bowels goshed out"
TWO:Up till then Robert had never troubled much about money. He did not want to buy books like Albert and Richard, neither did he care for drinking in Rye pubs with fishermen like Jemmy. But now everything was changed. He wanted money for Bessie. He wanted to marry her, and he must have money for that, no matter how meanly they started; and also he wanted to give her treats and presents, to cheer the dullness of her life. Reuben had indeed been wise in trying to keep the girls away from his sons!"Why, my Lord de Boteler," said Richard, taking up the writ, and glancing over the characters, "this is a prohibitory writ from the chancery! Where was this found?"
TWO:"Not seen to-dayhah!Has the fellow shrieved himself? or is he laid up after last night's tipple?"She had been a fool, and now she was paying the price of folly, which is always so much heavier than the price of sin. Here she was at twenty-five, prematurely old, exhausted, sick of life, and utterly alone. There[Pg 104] was no one to turn to in her wretchedness. Her neighbours were incapable of giving her real help or sympathy, Mrs. Backfield invariably took Reuben's part and resented the slightest criticism of him, old Gasson was hard and selfish, and not particularly interested in his daughter.
His headache had passed off, and he felt a man again; so he sought the woman. She lived in a small old house wedged tight between two new ones; her window was dark, and her threshold silent, though he knocked again and again. He walked up and down once or twice in front of the cottage whistling "Ropes and Rum"perhaps she had gone to do some shopping; he saw himself sitting down to a feast of pickled herrings in her kitchen."Hush! Hush! Oh! for the life of my husband, say not so!" The sternness of the monk's countenance gradually softened as he gazed upon his agonized sister, and, after the space of a minute he said, in a calm voice:"Please your grace," replied Wells, encouraged by the king's manner, "I am a vintner in the city of London, and I came down to Sudley with Stephen Holgrave's wife, to see what could be done for her husband."Reuben did not speak. His hands were clenched on the arms of his chair, and for the first time Rose noticed that he looked old. A faint feeling of disgust came over her. She shivered, and took a step backwards as if she would leave him. Then her warm good nature and her gratitude to the man who had made her so happy, drove away the unnatural mood. She came close, and slipped her soft arms round his neck, pressing her lips to his."Let's go away," she whispered, half nervously and half angrily, "I hate standing here."'Seventy-four was another bad year for Odiam, and it was more hopeless than its predecessors, for Reuben had now no expectations to sustain him. His position was really becoming serious. In '68 he had bought more land than he could afford, for fear that Grandturzel would buy it if he did not, and in '71 he had started his accursed milk-round, which had proved nothing but an expense and a failure. He still clung to it, for the shop by the Landgate gave him prestige, and he had always hoped that affairs would mend, but he was gradually coming to realise that prestige can be bought too dear, and that his affairs were too heavily clogged to improve of their own accord.
荣誉榜
THREE:"I was going to say, my Lord, that poor Stephen here has called nobody to speak to his good character, but may be it isn't wanting, for every man here, except one would go a hundred miles to say a good word for himBut my Lord, I was thinking how much money that house of Holgrave's cost in buildingLet me seeabout twenty florences, and then at a shilling a head from all of us here," looking round upon the yeomen, "would just build it up againI for one would not care about doing the smith's work at half price, and there's Denby the mason, and Cosgrave the carpenter, say they would do their work at the same rateBy St. Nicholas! (using his favorite oath) twelve florences would be more than enoughWell then my Lord, the business might be settled,"and he paused as if debating whether he should go farther.
THREE:Bessie was as surprised as she was delighted to hear that he should suddenly have found a friend to lend him ten pounds"a feller called Tim Harman, lives[Pg 159] over at Rolvenden," said Robert in a perspiring effort to be convincing. However, it never struck her to doubt his word, and she put down to emotion and hard running all that seemed strange in her sweetheart's manner."The child is exceedingly like you!" remarked Richard.
