FORE:"Suppose I amthink you they will sleep the worse because I stand on their grave? Oh! it is a fine thing," he continued, as if following up some reflection in his mind, "to bury those we hatedeep, deepso that they may never blast our sight again!Byles, you perjured yourself in that affair of the buck. You swore to aid me. You had gold for the service, and yet it would have been better that the beast were still alive, than to have left it behind in the chase: it has only brought suspicion on me, and given Holgrave a fresh triumph!"Naomi began now decidedly to improve. She put on flesh, and showed a faint interest in life. Towards the end of April she was able to come downstairs. She was obviously much better, and old Mrs. Backfield hinted that she was even better than she looked. Reuben watched over her anxiously, delighted to notice day by[Pg 109] day fresh signs of strength. She began to do little things for the children, she even seemed proud of them. They were splendid children, but it was the first time that she had realised it. She helped the scholastic elders with their sums and made frocks for the little girls. She even allowed baby Mathilda to wear Fanny's shoes.
FORE:Her mouth stretched mechanically into a smile, and at the same time a tear slid out of the corner of her eye, and rolled slowly over her thin cheeks. In the red, smouldering light of the sky behind Boarzell it looked like a tear of blood.
FORE:Moreover, she still sometimes had a vague feeling that at the start Harry had not been quite so mad as people thought, that he might perhaps have recovered if she had made him understand that she was true to him, still hoping. No doubt that was all nonsense, but she could not quite smother the idea that she had betrayed Harry. Perhaps it was partly because even before his accident she had cast longing eyes at Reuben. Once again she called up memories of him cutting down willows on his new land, and she acknowledged miserably to herself that in that hour she had already been unfaithful to Harry in her heart, and that all that came afterwards was but the following up of that initial act of treachery. A strong arm, a broad back, a blue shirt in the January twilight ... and Naomi had set out[Pg 105] on a road every step of which was now over rough stones and broken shards."The Lord's lost!" cried his father angrily. "You t?ake off them blacks, and git to work lik a human being."
THREE:"Fly, knaves!" cried the galleyman, addressing Byles and Calverley, as he released the latter. "And now, meddling steward, if you attempt to interfere with her who is in that holy berth yonder, or injure the honest yeoman, her son, for this night's doings, the Lord have mercy upon you! Here, Stephen," (walking towards Holgrave, who had thrown himself beside the grave,) "up, and jump behind on my horse, for the cry of sacrilege will edge their brands, and friend or foe will have little chance. Therethe abbey-gate is thrown open, and out they come with brand and torch."
THREE:"Shot one of my cows!" and Reuben sprang to his feet. "Where woman? Where?"
