Chapter II: Part 2

After the operation was performed Byron had inquired after her welfare, but had not come to see her. Although so happily occupied he felt at times a little uneasy. Sabina's attraction for him had been her flawless health and the amputation aroused in him, not pity, but a faint stirring of repugnance. He sent her a message that he "must be on the spot to see to things," and, undemonstrative herself and not yet instructed as to the nature of the "things," she had accepted his excuse. A day came, however, when he felt that he must overcome his unwillingness to see for himself the difference in her which the operation had made. Liddicoat was pressing for payment, and he had other liabilities. He rode into Stowe, therefore, rode at his usual breakneck pace and, having stabled his horse, called at the hospital.

Although his visit was unexpected, Sabina had had the long leisure of a slow convalescence in which to arrange her thoughts and make plans for the future. Leadville had tried to take advantage of her being ill. He had thought that when she recovered she would accept the changes he had introduced. He had acted like a child without thought of the consequences. The foolish fellow! Sabina was not angered. She had always been an indulgent wife, and she could overlook this attempt to steal a march on her, as she had overlooked his many efforts to get the management of the farm into his hands.

Looking neither to the right nor to the left, Byron dragged his reluctant feet up the ward. Sabina, who disliked sewing, and did not care to read, had been lying back on her pillows, her hands folded on the white sheet. As she caught sight of the well-known figure; a little flush of surprised pleasure spread over her pale cheeks. She was very glad to see him. In her eyes his breadth and heaviness, the strong growth of his black hair, the jut of his square chin, were so many attractions. She had always admired his strength; and the evidences of it in deep chest and hairy skin were to her taste. She could have wished, however, that he would look up, would answer her ready smile, instead of staring before him like a bull who is not quite certain whether the people he is encountering are friend or foe. She had no suspicion that every step her husband took was more unwilling than the last.

The moment came when he must look at her. His furtive glance swept in one unhappy second the bed and its occupant, then he bent forward and gave her a clumsy kiss. The truth was not as bad as he had feared. By some deft arrangement of the clothes the bed gave a false impression. As far as appearances went the woman in it might have been in possession of her limbs. Byron, escaping the shock he had expected, experienced, however, one of a different kind. The face he touched was indeed that of his wife, but it was changed. Sabina's red-gold hair, which had been rippling and abundant, the very symbol of her gay vitality, had lost its colour. When he last saw her a bandage had concealed it, now, white as that bandage, it framed a face lined and haggard.

"Why--my dear life--" he stammered, staring, "'ow your 'air 'av altered."

She put a hand to her head. "Yer didn't know? Well, can't be 'elped."

"Yer 'air was awful pretty." The change troubled him vaguely; he was not pleased to find that his wife, who had kept her looks beyond the average, should have aged.

"I reckon I'm as God made me, but I was never one to trouble about my looks." She sought for words to express her thought. "Red 'air or white, I'm the same."

"Iss," he said and continued to look at her thoughtfully.

She might be the same woman, but her effect upon others, and in particular on himself, would be different. "'Ow be 'ee?"

"I've 'ad a prettily and draggin' time, but now I'm doin' grand."

He uttered a rough sound of no meaning, but she took it to be congratulatory.

"I shall be up afore long."

"Up?" he murmured, glancing sideways at the bed.

"I shall get Raby Gregor to make me a little trolly so that I can get about."

He pushed his chair farther away. In spite of appearances she was not a woman, but the distorted remnant of one. A shiver ran down his spine. "You bain't thinkin' of--of tryin' to get about?"

"Me not gettin' about? Iss. You've never seen me settin' down wi' me 'ands folded."

"But you'll find things'll be different now," he stammered. He thought of the trolly as some sort of wheel-chair. He had no conception of his wife's inventiveness or of her indifference to comment. "You've been a strong woman, but you can't look to be that again."

The resolute look he knew so well came into Sabina's eyes, and for a moment he doubted whether after all she would not conquer her disabilities. "I bain't strong now," she said, "but a month or two'll make all the difference. I'll soon be up and about again."

The momentary doubt passed. "I wouldn't make too sure of that, then," he told her. The fact that Wastralls had not so much flat land as would make a football field was reassuring. No wheel-chair, whatever the power of its directing will, could climb up and down those fields.

"I'm hopin'," said Sabina obstinately, "to teel Wastralls as I 'av before."

"We must see 'ow you do frame."

"Bain't a matter of gettin' about," she continued, guessing his thoughts. "I know Wastralls like the palm of my hand, every 'itch and stitch of it, and the 'inds'll carry out my orders. I can trust old George Biddick to see as the others do their work. I've planned it all."

"And me?" asked Leadville grimly.

"My dear feller, you don't like farmin', you wouldn't make no 'and at it, you an' your old rigmaroles."

"I c'd teel Wastralls so as it brought in double what you get now."

She shook her head. "You bain't goin' to try."

It was as well for her peace of mind that eyes cannot speak. That this mutilated trunk of a woman should still be in a position to withstand him! His great chest heaved with bitter emotion, but he did not answer.

"Come," said Sabina peaceably. "Tell me how things is going."

He stared out of the window until he had mastered himself sufficiently to speak. "I came to ask mun for what you aw Liddicoat."

"Aw Liddicoat?" A smiling light came into her eyes. "How much do I aw'n?"

"Couldn't tell 'ee for a pound or two; but if you was to draw out a cheque for me I could full'n soon as I get 'ome."

"You send me in the bill and I'll pay'n after I've checked'n."

Byron's face darkened. He would not be able to hide from her much longer the changes he had attempted. What did it matter? She could only be angry. He thought he would be glad if she were. "There's the men's money--three weeks 'awin'."

"I give'n Isolda yesterday. I expect she's paid'n by now."

"You ought to 'ave give it to me and I could 'av paid'n."

"So I should 'av," she answered peaceably, "if you'd been in to see me. But I give it to Isolda instead."

He was not to be placated. "Looks mighty queer you don't trust me with the money. I've to keep the place goin' and if I don't pay the 'inds who's to know I'm maister?"

"There's no need, for you bain't maister. You may blate morning till night, you won't 'av Wastralls, no never for, come to that, I don't trust 'ee."

"S'bina!"

She held up her hand. "You do take too much on your own 'ead."

He knew then that the tale of his imprudent labours had run before him and that she was expressing her disapproval. She was not angry with him; a mother is not angry when she sequestrates a forbidden toy. "I always thought," he stammered, making no further mystery of the matter, "that we should grow sugar-beet."

"An' you was welcome to try it--at Polnevas. Now come, it bain't too late to put the li'l medder in dredge-corn. You'd better see to't at once, or I'll 'av Tom do't."

He cried out at that last humiliation and it was still the same cry, the cry his wife thought so unreasonable. "You'd put Tom Rosevear over me? You'd take away what belong to me?"

"'Long to you? I should like to know 'ow it come yours."

"You give it me, you give it me when we married."

"Never."

In his disappointment and rage he stumbled over his words. "You'll see, you'll see! Iss, you'll see whether I won't 'av it or no."

"'Tis mazedness of 'ee to think so," she answered. "Come, be sensible. I'll pay for these old fads of yours and you can pile'n away where you mind to. I'll pay this once, but 'twas a fulish game for 'ee to play and maybe you'll see that before you'm done."

*CHAPTER III*

Near St. Cadic Mill, at the head of the valley, a hamlet had gathered, a few deep-set cottages built of cliff stone and planted irregularly about a smithy. Sheltered by a rise in the land from sea winds their gardens were rich with produce. A green broadened from their little gates and in the wall of the smithy had been set a scarlet post-box, a flaring touch of the official in a land sufficient unto itself.

In these, houses, which were known far and wide as 'Cottages,' dwelt a cobbler, who was also the barber of the community: Mrs. Bate, the Stripper; her friend Aunt Louisa Blewett, the seamstress: one or two independent labourers, and an old sailor. Here, too, was the Dolphin, where could be obtained a little muddy cider and some home-brewed; also, the village shop. The self-respecting and thrifty community was like a family which, having grown up and married, had continued to live in a group, separated only by the walls of their homes and gardens. Ties, acknowledged and unacknowledged, linked them, linked them also with the farmer folk; and, as all respected the axiom that you must not 'step on a Cornishman's tail,' the hamlet was to the outward eye an abode of peace.

Mrs. Byron's accident had caught the imagination of her humble neighbours. For years they had watched her riding about, a wholesome hearty woman with a ripe cheek and a commanding eye. Not one of them, but had had experience of her vigour and capacity. She was now reduced to a helplessness greater than that of child or dotard and to her helplessness was added the mystery of mutilation.

During the long light weeks the cottagers sat at their doors of an evening and, while Charley Brenton trimmed hair in the front garden, discussed the inopportune event.

"I was almost sure there was ill luck comin'," said Mrs. Bate, the woman who was Stripper, or Nurse for the hamlet, that is to say who laid out the dead.

The man upon whom the barber was operating was a Brenton from the neighbouring valley of Polscore. The gossip was new to him.

"'Ow d'yer think so?" he asked.

"I b'lieve she was ill-wished. Never mind 'ow I think so, you wait an' see. My belief, there's they 'av got an evil eye on 'er."

Aunt Louisa Blewett looked up from her sewing. She was a peculiarly neat and clean old woman, who spent her time going from one house to another, mending and making for the long families. She did not speak, but her toothless mouth worked as if over a choice morsel.

"I thought the witches were all gone years ago," remarked the stranger Brenton.

"Well, there is witches, only they don't come out in their true colour," asserted Mrs. Bate, whose mother was said to have been the last in Tregols.

"Besides," urged old Hawken, the sailor, who was sitting on a stone awaiting his turn at Charley Brenton's hands, "who's goin' to do Mrs. Byron any 'arm? A nicer woman never lived. She's noted for 'er kindness at Christmas time or any other time."

"Iss, iss, we knaw she's well liked," said Mrs. Bate non-committally. Unlike Aunt Louisa she had still an occasional milestone of tooth. The old women were handsome now, and what must they have been when they were the village belles? "Still, I b'lieve there's one that bear 'er a grudge. I don't mention any names but you can think 'oo you like."

"Go along, you don't think as 'e'd do 'er a mischief do yer?"

"Hush!"

For some time the sound of approaching hoofs had been carried to them on the still air of the evening; and the voices died into silence as Leadville Byron, on his black stallion, clattered by. The animal was as usual flecked with foam, the master stained with the mud of the road. Returning from his humiliating interview with Sabina, he had found in the hard gallop up hill and down, an outlet for his rage and disappointment. What did he care if he lamed the horse? Whirling through the hamlet he noticed the curious cottagers no more than the birds in the hedges.

"'Ow 'e do ride," said old Hawken, as the furious figure melted into the growing dusk and only the beat of the hoofs reached the listeners, a beat which in turn was merged in the distant sound of the tide. "One of these days 'e'll break 'is neck."

"'Tis like 'e's tearin' away from something," said Aunt Louisa suddenly.

"Do 'ee think," said Mrs. Bate, lowering her voice, "do 'ee think th' Old Squire knaw what's happenin' above ground?"

"If 'e do," said Hawken, "'e must find it terr'ble 'ard for that feller to be in 'is place."

"And alterin' things," said Aunt Louisa.

"Old Squire," said Mrs. Bate mysteriously, "can look after's own. You mark my words, thiccy feller 'ont 'av all 'is own way."

Willie Brenton took the towel from his neck and handed it to the sailor. "Your turn, Mr. 'Awken."

The old man got up painfully. "My feet's terr'ble knucklin' to-day and my poor laigs is stiff with the rheumatism; but still they'm better'n no laigs. I wonder 'ow poor Mrs. Byron'll manage?"

This was a matter of interest to the cottagers. They supposed that, for the cooking and cleaning, Mrs. Byron would employ one of themselves. Mrs. Bate, who had not been married, had yet grandchildren old enough to go out to service.

"We've all worked there in an' out," she said, "but now the poor thing'll 'av to 'av some one there altogether. She'll be so helpless as a baby."

"I bet she won't," said Aunt Louisa, folding together a patched garment and preparing to go indoors for the night. "Mrs. Byron'll frighten us all yet for what she can do."

"I reckon she 'ont 'av the 'eaft to go about the work as she used to. My mind tell me she's done for," said Hawken.

Aunt Louisa nodded her trim grey head in the direction of Church Town. "Not till she's laid alongside the Old Squire," she said and, going in, shut her door with the precision of touch characteristic of her every movement.

At Wastralls, the following morning, Byron went as usual into the yard. Two breeding sows, black as a cave's mouth, were wandering about and, on a heap of straw in the sun, lay an old sheep-dog. The dog wagged its tail but, unfortunately, did not rise and the man's sore heart registered its laziness as an affront.

"Shep's gone past for work," he said to George Biddick, who was standing by waiting for orders.

"Iss, I b'lieve 'e is. Gettin' blind."

"Better give'm a dose. You come to me at twelve and I'll 'av it ready for 'ee." He cast a vindictive look at the old dog. "And, Biddick..."

"Iss, sir?"

"I've changed my mind about the li'l medder. I'm afraid 'tis too late for sugar-beet this year, I'll 'av it teeled in dredge-corn."

He went back to the kitchen, a roomy whitewashed place, the rafters of which were dark above the blue flagstones, stones which had been worn smooth by feet, trampling for a little to and fro, then going as they had come. In a wall-cupboard to the right of the slab-range, the farmer kept such matters as ammunition, packets of seed, medicaments for the stock. Crossing the kitchen, with a step which was light for so large-framed a man, he stood for a moment contemplating the medley of articles--bluestone, cattle-salts, turpentine, oak-marbles which had been through the coffee grinder, bottles of Red Drink--which confronted him. By the last named stood a small blue bottle with an orange label. He had bought it some time ago, he had used it on old and useless animals. He would pour out a little now and give it to Biddick for the sheep-dog; but the rest he would put by again. He felt that to rid the place of Shep would be a satisfaction. If only other things which stood in his way, which refused to recognize his authority, could be got rid of as easily.

Sabina's interview with her husband had made her realize how necessary she was to him. She thought of him as a foolish child who, the moment it was left to its own devices, got into mischief. The conviction that she stood between Leadville and disaster was soothing. It increased her wish to live and was as good as a tonic. Not that tonics were necessary, for once she had turned the first difficult corner she made good progress and, when Raby Gregor came to discuss with her the trolly she had designed, he was agreeably surprised to find her as cheerful as of old.

This trolly was for long the wonder of those who saw it. On a three-wheeled stand, a cone of cushioned basket-work, itself strengthened by iron stays, had been set upright. Into this wicker receptacle Sabina, who had strong arms, presently learnt to swing herself and, once in place, the cushions supported her in comfort. The front wheel of the trolly had a guiding handle and she was thus enabled, as long as the ground was flat, to go where she would.

"I want to be on a level with other people," she said, "so don't make the stand too low. I can't bear to be down; 'av to look up to everybody as I'm speaking to'm."

The little contrivance, when finished, proved admirably suited to her needs. The nurses, proud of her as a case, helped her over the first difficulties; and, as the figure she cut did not trouble her, she soon learnt to swing herself in and out. Before long she was able to steer herself about the ward and Mrs. Tom, coming in one afternoon with eggs for the patients and saffron cake for the nurses' tea, found her pushing herself about as contentedly as a child.

"I shall be comin' 'ome next week," she said happily, "so Leadville can send in the cart for me."

"I shall be pretty and glad for 'ee to come 'ome again, but why must 'e send the old cart?"

"Why, to bring this 'ome in." She put her hands to the sides of the trolly and sat erect, a smiling cheerful woman. Her face, though pale from the long confinement, had lost its lines, was indeed showing a tendency to over-fullness and she looked older, but she was herself again. "If I didn't I should 'av to lie down an' I don't want to do that. I want to sit up and see all there is to be seen. Besides I want for the people to see I'm able to get about again, if I be a cripple."

Mrs. Tom perceived that Sabina meant to celebrate her recovery by a triumphal return. "Well, my dear, I'll tell Leadville to send in the cart for 'ee."

"This 'ere thing do run so smooth as a die," said Sabina, returning to her happy absorption in the trolly. "You'd never believe 'ow easy I can get about in it," and she began, with her strong, illness-whitened hands, to turn the wheels.

"Will it go uphill?" said the other, after observing with interest the paces of this new steed.

Sabina's face fell. "Lorrd bless me, I never thought o' that!"

"'Owever will you manage?" Only the shelf on which Wastralls--house, yard and garden--stood, was flat.

"I..." Sabina hesitated. The brightness had died cut of her face. "I don't know if Leadville will carry out my wishes or no."

"Well, you can 'ardly expect 'un to."

"I dun't see why 'e shouldn't. 'Tis my land, why shouldn't 'e do as I want for'n to do?"

"'Cos 'e's so obstinate in 'is way as you are in yours."

"My dear life, I bain't obstinate. 'Ow can 'ee say so? I only do same as my father and granfer did. I'm sure they wouldn't like for me to alter it."

"No, I don't 'spose they would," said Mrs. Tom, "still..."

Sabina was troubled, but not on account of Isolda's mistaken view of her character. That she had already forgotten. "Well, I've got th' old George Biddick. I'm sure 'e'll do what I want for'n to do, if Leadville won't."

"Still that isn't like seein' for yerself."

"I shall 'av to take the chance of that," but she did not seem happy about it. She mused with knit brow for some seconds, then changed the subject. "Isolda, I'd like for Mrs. Bate to put my bed up in the big room."

This--the old Justice Room--occupied one end of the house. For many years it had been used as a storeroom, but underneath dust and litter lay evidence, in painted panelling and marble mantelpiece, of former state.

"'Tis a proper old lumber-shop," said Mrs. Tom, "but that doesn't matter."

"You see," explained Sabina, "I can't go overstairs."

"I wonder 'ow Leadville'll like sleepin' on the ground floor?"

"Well, he must like it or lump it." She spoke with the confidence of one whose marriage had been a success. "We'll get the room to rights for yer."

"And Isolda, I don't want to keep on Mrs. Bate, nor I don't want her Jenifer nor her Janey."

"'Ow'll 'ee manage then?"

"I want some one of my own flesh and blood. I should love to 'av one of your li'l maids. Why couldn't I 'av Gray? We've always 'greed like chickens."

"Well, I don't know I'm sure." Mrs. Tom had been expecting this, she had even schemed for it. She had five daughters, pretty maidens all of them, and Gray was the eldest. What more suitable than that she should fill a daughter's place at Wastralls? Nevertheless it would not be wise to jump at the offer. "She's young to go from 'ome."

"Wastralls is only next door and she'll be all right with me."

"An' 'as you've none of yer own," agreed Mrs. Tom, "Gray's the nearest."

Whatever Sabina's intentions, however, she would not promise to make the girl her heir. "'Twill be for the maid's good," she said vaguely.

"I'll see what Tom got to say about it." Gray was eighteen and, with Richbell coming on, could well be spared. No doubt Mrs. Constantine Rosevear would think Wastralls ought eventually to go to one of her sons; but, in this world, a hen scratched up what she could for her own chicks.

"Gray think more 'bout 'ome than Richbell," Sabina said thoughtfully. "She's not after the chaps so much."

The mother's pride was touched. "Whenever she go up round the parish, there's always three or four pairs of eyes lookin' at Gray. She can always 'av a chap if she like, but she don't trouble whether she do or no."

"Is there any special young man, do 'ee think?"

"Well now, I don't care to say..."

Sabina's curiosity was aroused. "Now Isolda, there's somethin' gone on since I come in 'ere. Who is it?"

Mrs. Rosevear had spent some of the happiest hours of her life, discussing her children with this trusty friend. "No stranger," she said smilingly.

"Who then?"

"One of your 'inds."

The other opened her eyes. "My dear life, didn't she ought to be lookin' for some one better off?"

"She don't think anything of money."

"They don't at that age, we got to do that for'm. Who is it then?"

"Why, Jim Rosevear, the yard-man."

Mrs. Byron knitted her brows in an endeavour to recall the young man's face. "Jim Rosevear? He come just before my accident. I can't think who 'ee is."

"Why, iss you do. You know, Jack Rosevear of Treketh's son."

"Jack Rosevear--th' old chap who's so contrary?"

"That's of'm. When he get in a temper, you know, 'ee take off 'is 'at, swing'n around, and fling'n down and stamp on it."

"Oh iss, I know, I remember." She meditated. "That 'edn't as bad after all."

"No, 'tedn't bad, though 'ee've quarrelled with's father. But Mrs. Andrews over to Gentle Jane is 'is auntie and, as she's nobody of 'er own and 'er man's dead, there's a farm there and Jim's nothing to do but go in and 'ang up 'is 'at."

"Then what's ah doin' at Wastralls?"

Isolda smiled, that secret smile of the mother. "Well, you needn't ask me that. Ed'n Wastralls next door to Hember?"

"So that's it, is it?"

"There was heaps o' maidens after 'im, for 'e's a pretty boy and, at Christmas Tree last New Year, 'e ad some mistletoe in's cap and they all astin' for't; but Gray was the one 'e gived it to. And that's 'ow 'e come to you as yard-man."

"And do she think anything 'bout 'im?"

"I believe she do, but she don't go round and tell everybody what she's doin'. She's so meek as a mouse."

"Then tedn't known?"

"You're the first I've told anything to about it."

Sabina nodded. "Then if Gray comes to me, it'll hurry matters up?"

"Well, I'm very 'greeable for 'er to 'av 'im, 'cos I think 'e's a nice boy."

"And Gentle Jane is a nice farm and you've four other maidens? Well, I dunno as I shall want to lose 'er as soon as I get 'er, still we can settle that by and by."

*CHAPTER IV*

A few days, spent in trundling herself about the ward, and Mrs. Byron was ready for the long journey, over Big Hill and down to the sea. Leadville, who saw in her return the extinction of his last hope, had not the heart to come for her.

"Pretty pickle I should look," he said to Mrs. Tom, "drivin' missus 'ome sittin' up in that trolly, showin' 'erself off like that. Better fit she should 'av Mr. Brenton's covered cart and cover 'erself up. Any one'd think she'd want to 'ide 'er affliction."

"You fancy S'bina 'idin' of it?" said Mrs. Tom, who had suggested his going. "She'll be quite proud for people to see 'er goin' about with 'er poor old stumps. Leavin' out 'er laigs, you knaw, she's as strong as ever."

When he frowned Byron's black brows came together in an ominous line. "Strong as ever?" he said, "that's different from what Dr. Derek told me. He give me no encouragement as she'll make old bones."

"I wouldn't give much for that, then. She'll be like a barley weed, always dyin' and never dead." She had been cleaning the house in readiness for Mrs. Byron's return; and now, her labours ended, was drinking a cup of tea with the master of it. "They old Rosevears was long-livin' and they do say, she's more like Old Squire than either Tom or Constantine be. 'Oo be 'ee gwine send in for 'er?"

"Jim can go in for 'er; there is two or three things wanted into Shoppe"--this was another hamlet in the widespread parish--"and 'e can bring 'em 'ome."

"I'm sorry you bain't goin'. You're the one ought to fetch 'er."

"I've got a very poor 'eart for that sort of thing and this'll be worse than Hobby-horse goin' to Traytor."

"Iss," nodded Mrs. Tom. "I bet everybody'll turn out to give S'bina a welcome 'ome. After all, your ways bain't like our ways."

Leadville could not let that pass. "I might 'a 'bin born down east o' Truro, still I can't tell you whether I was or no. But I feel in my bones an' veins that I'm no 'foreigner.' Couldn't fancy this place as I do if it wadn't so."

"'Tis your misfortune," said Mrs. Tom, taking her cloak from the door-peg, "as you fancy it so. If you was one of we, you'd act different."

Mrs. Byron had a bright day for her journey, a day with but one cloud. The staff of the hospital had gathered to see her start and when, on her trolly, and followed by her luggage and a certain long wooden box, oddly suggestive of a shortened coffin, she rolled herself down the hall and into the roadway, they broke into a cheer. The gallant bearing of this mutilated creature had drawn from them an emotional response. The beauty of it, the poignancy, touched them. Men pressed forward to offer their help and tears stood in the eyes of the women. That was the spirit, this elemental courage, this defiance of unhappy fate. Yes, Sabina was indeed true descendant of Old Squire--he to whom men for so long had given their respect.

In the road, drawn up and waiting, stood the farm wagon. Jim Rosevear, with a proper sense of the ceremonial nature of the occasion, had plaited the horses' manes and tails with coloured worsteds. The brass harness twinkled in the sun and the cart-horses had been groomed until their coats were nearly as bright. Sabina, occupied with her trolly, which was showing a tendency to turn a little to the left, was not immediately aware that the driver was not her husband. Not indeed until the trolly had been lifted to its place on the floor of the wagon and secured by ropes, was she at liberty to look about.

When she saw who was come for her she leaned forward in the cone. "Where's the maister to?" she asked.

Jim, who was getting ready to start, looked over his shoulder. "He's gone fishin'."

"Fishin'?" She had thought he might have gone on business down one of the many crooked streets of the little town, business from which he would return in time to drive her home.

"Fishin' for bass on the Head."

"Whatever took'n in the 'ead to do that to-day?" she said and dwelt for a moment on the incomprehensible nature of man. Strange that Leadville should not want to share her triumph, the triumph of the woman who belonged to him, who was flesh of his flesh; to share this triumph which was, in part, his. She had been in excellent spirits, but his absence dashed them. It required the manifested goodwill of the people in the streets to restore her equanimity.

In spite of this drawback, however, her progress was, in its way, royal. Throned in the wagon she passed slowly along the main road. Placed thus high and with trunk and head emerging from the wicker cone like an amazing flower, she was undoubtedly a queer figure; but the people who came running up the lanes and out of the houses along the route, to give her the blessing of their good wishes, missed the queerness. They had known her all the forty years of her life. She was part of the setting in which they played their humble parts. A little prejudiced in her favour through long association, this display of primitive courage moved them. They welcomed it as in keeping with the family tradition, as something worthy, and they offered it the kind encouragement of hearty handshakes and good words.

"I be pretty an' glad to see yer come 'ome again, ma'am. Terrible, terrible accident, you must 'av 'ad; still you don't seem to make much of't. Mary Elizabeth's brought 'ee a few lilies."

"That trolly be a clever thought of yours, Mrs. Byron. I never see nothing like it before."

"I reckon you've 'ad a draggin' time, ma'am. We'm all glad to 'av 'ee back again."

"Do 'ee take and drink up this cup of milk and eat a bit of yeller cake or 'ee'll be faintin' before 'ee come to Trevorrick," said a farmer's wife.

"If 'ee'd like a glass of wine now, you've only to say the word, and you can 'av it," interposed the landlord of the Dolphin; "I'd be proud to serve 'ee."

"I be come 'ome," said Sabina to her charioteer as they jogged on and her voice had a contented ring. She had forgotten the disappointment of Leadville's absence. She was come back to her own people and her own place and she was welcome.

The young man lifted a smiling face and she remembered that this was the 'pretty boy' who was courting her niece. She looked at him with interest. He was certainly good-looking, definitely so, a tall slim youth with a fine profile, deeply-set dark-blue eyes, black hair and a small tawny moustache. She wondered how the courtship was progressing. Gray, with cloudy hair about a wind-flower face, would make a charming bride. Sabina's thoughts ran nimbly forward. She saw the young couple housed at Wastralls, Rosevear working the farm under her direction and the old cradle once more in use. The prospect promised her an autumn happiness. Wonderful indeed, the way in which the wind is tempered to the shorn!

When the farm cart turned off the highway by St. Cadic Mill, Sabina found Constantine Rosevear and his wife waiting by the roadside. The big florid man, though he had wife and three grown sons, had never been able to forget that Sabina was the woman he should have married. His Betsey was all right but, about Sabina, lingered the glamour of romance.

"I been in terrible fear," he told her simply, "and I'm 'avin' holiday to-day. If you don't mind I'll walk down to Wastralls with you. You don't know 'ow glad I be to see ye 'ome again and lookin' so well too."

Sabina's heart beat irregularly for a moment. If only Leadville would talk to her like this! She comforted herself with the thought that his being undemonstrative did not mean he was unfeeling. Words did not come easily to him, but still waters run deep.

The cottagers about the smithy threw more flowers into the cart. "Might be May Day," as Sabina said, with her happy smile. At Hember, Tom Rosevear was waiting with four of his daughters. "Mother's down to Wastralls wi' Gray," he said and the blooming girls, the so-called nieces, raised their young voices in affectionate greeting. 'Aunt S'bina' had been the fairy godmother of the family, always willing to abet them in any piece of innocent fun. They were sincerely glad to have her back.

The drive had been long for one just out of hospital, but the kindliness of friends and neighbours had proved a stimulant. When the wagon turned into the yard of Wastralls, however, Sabina was almost too tired to note the changes that had been made. The absence of the honeysuckle caused the porch to look bare, the old sheepdog was no longer lying in the sun; but Leadville had come back from the fishing and was ready to lift her down. At sight of him the tired face brightened. "I'm glad to come 'ome again," she said.

The man had been standing idly by the door. Having drawn nothing out of the sea he had come back in a mood which was not uninfluenced by his lack of success. Everything had gone wrong, his hopes were dashed, his plans had miscarried and he searched the landscape in vain for any hope of change. Sabina was well again, she had already asserted her will with regard to the farm and before him lay a future as dreary as the past.

He lifted his eyes as the beflowered cortege rolled into the yard. He had expected a sort of chair and the trolly with its basket-work cone was an unpleasant surprise; while the sight of his wife, in brightly coloured gown and pink sunbonnet, swelling out of it like a monstrous fruit, completed his dismay. She was a figure of fun, a queer oddity, repellent as something out of nature. The bravery that faced the sunshine as simply as in the days of its strength did not appeal to him, he was only conscious of the deformity. His heart contracted, emptied itself of good-will, then slowly filled again--but not with kindliness.

The business of unloading occupied the men for some minutes and Mrs. Rosevear, taking the parcels, handed them to her daughter.

"What a lovely lot o' flowers. I should think every garden for miles round will be bare."

"Take care o' that box," cried Sabina, suddenly, as they lifted out the case that was suggestive of a coffin. "I value that."

"Where be 'ee gwine put it, auntie?"

"In the cupboard in the big parlour."

"What 'av 'ee got in it?"

"Ah, my dear, ask me no questions and I tell 'ee no lies."

"'Ere, I'll take that," said Mrs. Tom, intervening, "I know where it got to be put. 'Tis what you told me of, S'bina?"

Mrs. Byron nodded. "Iss, I've brought it back wi' me. Doctor said I was maaeze to do it; but I said I would, an' I 'av."

A meal was ready on the kitchen table, a piece of stout wood which had weathered the use and elbow-grease of more than a century. This room had been for three generations the gathering-place of the family. Innumerable savoury meals had been cooked on the slab range; hams in a succession longer than that of the Kings of England had been lifted from the rafter hooks and, after the buffetings of winter and the scorch of summer, men had taken their ease on the bench while women made and mended. Old tales had been told and retold by deep voices, tales of witches, of wreckers, of people 'pisky-led'n'; and the sound of them lingered in the dim corners. They were waiting for the new generation which should utter once more the familiar words and keep alive the traditions.

"I never thought I should ever be back 'ere any more," said Sabina, contentedly, as she ran her trolly up to the table and, by a contrivance similar to that on a dentist's chair, reduced her height to a sitting level. "It do seem good to be 'ome. Everything look so natural."

"Well, 'twould be funny if it didn't," said Mrs. Rosevear, helping the meat.

"Don't seem as if I'd been all that time away."

"I expect it do to Leadville."

His wife turned to him. "What do 'ee think of my invention?"

"I can't abide it," said the man, with the emphasis of sincere feeling.

The others looked at him in surprise. "I'll always be thinking of what you was," he added hastily.

Sabina's face clouded, but only for a moment. "Let's make the best of things," she said. "I'm goin' to forget about them times, I'm goin' to live for the moment."

"I'm not one as forgets," said Leadville heavily.

Revived by food and rest Sabina was soon impatient to begin a further progress. She trundled herself into the linhay to inspect the milk and butter; then into the two seldom-used rooms known as the Big and Little Parlour. Beyond them lay the wide shallow stairs, the door into the front part of the house and the long Justice Room.

Mrs. Tom threw open the door of this and Sabina, pushing the trolly in, uttered an exclamation of pleasure. The litter of agricultural implements, broken harness, bags and boxes, had been cleared away, the grates had been blacked and the panelled wall painted a shadowy grey. Between the two fireplaces stood a large bed, the posts of which were carved with corn, fruit and other emblems of fertility. On it lay a patchwork quilt, the work of Sabina's grandmother. Drift-wood fires flamed under the white marble mantelpieces and the coverlet shone with the glistening silks of other days. The spacious room with its white-hung bed and its white curtains, smelt of the sea and Sabina turned and smiled at her husband.

"'Av you moved your clothes down?" she asked.

"Not that I know of."

"Well, you better make 'aste an' do't."

Looking past her into the beautiful room he thought dimly that it was too large. "I shent like it down 'ere," he said and something ancestral moved in him, assuring him that the upper parts of a house, the upper branches, were secure from the marauding enemy, the terror by night. "Never sleeped on the ground-floor."

Laying a hand affectionately on his shoulder, the woman looked into his face with a touch of softening and appeal. Surely he would not leave her to sleep there alone?

To the man, this light touch was illuminating. "Oh, leave'n go," he muttered.

In the bedroom, Gray Rosevear was moving deftly to and fro, unpacking Sabina's clothes and laying them in the drawers of the tall-boy. The man's eyes followed her light figure, at first unconsciously, but before long with a strange quickening of emotion. If it had been this girl who was asking him, he would have given up his eyrie with an eager willingness. He did not understand himself. What was Gray to him?

His wife's voice when she spoke again, seemed a whisper from far away. "I can't go overstairs," she said pleadingly.

Byron turned his eyes deliberately from Gray's wildflower grace to the thick shortened figure in the trolly and his incipient repugnance grew. Sleep with this deformity? He could not bring himself to it. To live in the same house with her would be difficult; at least he would shut her out of his nights. Already he knew instinctively what those nights, moon-silvered, star-set, nights not of bitter brooding but of dreams, would be to him.

"I can't sleep 'ere."

Sabina sighed. The people had given her the froth of sweet words but this was reality. "Well, my dear, I can't 'elp it," she said resignedly. "I can't do much nowadays."

"Ah now, if 'ee'd only reckernize that."

The touch of opposition was a spur. "Still there's a lot as I can do. This trolly now, 'll 'elp me a lot."

He eyed it with distaste. "Oogly thing, can't think why 'ee do want to be runnin' round like a toad on a red-'ot shovel. Seein' 'ow you be, 'twould be more to your credit if you was to die down and be quiet, 'stead o goin' about on an old thing like that. You'll be the laughing-stock of the parish."

"Nothin' 'ud get done."

"Oh, fiddlesticks, 'ow won't the things be done? Can't I do't for yer?" For the moment Gray was forgotten and he was back at the old gnawing bitterness.

"Whiles my 'ead's above ground, I'll look after the place myself," said Sabina who, being tired, was a little captious. She was disappointed that her welcome home had been so commonplace. She had expected, she knew not what, but something culminating.

"A pretty mess 'ee'll make of it," muttered Leadville and, turning about, walked off with himself. When he and Sabina differed, which was not often--their differences being fundamental, trifles took the subsidiary place so seldom granted them--he invariably ended the discussion by going out of the house. With all the open from which to choose it was easy for him to get away from a woman's tiresomeness, to get back to his own quiet company and his thoughts.

Sabina looked after the husband whom she had long ago decided was difficult, but probably not more so than other men, and her heart sank. She had so wanted Leadville to rejoice with her over her recovery, to be proud of her. Though she carried herself gallantly there were periods when her poor heart acknowledged a weakness, a lowness. She had longed sometimes to stay it on a greater strength.

"Where's Gray goin' to sleep?" asked Mrs. Rosevear who, standing quietly in the background, had been a shrewd spectator.

"Gray?" said she, and a feeling seldom hitherto experienced, awoke in her. If she had been as young as Gray, soft-eyed as she, would it have made a difference?

"Twill be a bit lonely for 'er upstairs," said the mother thoughtfully. "Though, of course, Leadville'll be near."

But it was envy, not jealousy, that had been awakened in Mrs. Byron. "Let her come in wi' me. We'll 'av a little bed put up, there's plenty of room for 'er."

When Leadville came back, and he must in time grow accustomed to the idea of sleeping on the ground-floor, a fresh arrangement could be made. Meanwhile the maid would be company. Sabina felt that the place was peopled with the judges and judged of long ago and, to her Celtic mind, the shadows moved. In the dark hours it would be comforting to hear the movements, the breathing, of some one still this side the grave.

From an upper chamber they brought the small bedstead which, when Mrs. Byron was a girl, had been hers; also a chest of drawers.

"Where's your traaede to?" asked the mother.

"Jim's bringin' it down. I believe he's out in the kitchen now. I'll go and see."

As she went from the room Mrs. Rosevear sank into the nearest chair. "I'm glad you'm back, S'bina. I bin so whisht without 'ee. Not a soul to speak to besides Tom and you can't tell a man very much."

"No, they don't understand." Her thoughts wandered for a moment. Leadville had been strange in his manner but of course it was only that he did not understand.

"Now you've seen Jim," continued Mrs. Rosevear, "what do you think of him?"

Sabina roused herself. "I call 'ee a proper chap," she said smilingly. "Lovely curly 'air he 'as."

"Yes," confided the mother, "and Gray's as maaeze as a rattle about 'im."

Mrs. Tom's confidences made Sabina feel as if she had a share in the other's happy motherhood. They sat gossiping until the shadows began to fill the valley. Jim was a long time on his way with Gray's box--but to every man and woman their hour!

Leadville, on leaving the house, had turned his face towards the cliff. Beyond its dark wall was space and light. He took the little path that led over the head, passed the deep curves of what in prehistoric times had been the earthworks of a stockaded hold and came out upon a broad shelf of rock. The tide was in, large green waves were rolling, with a break like gunfire, into the caves below, and, facing him, was one of the strange sunsets often seen on that coast. The western sky was scarlet and across the light was a trail of black clouds.

"A red sky at night, is the shepherd's delight," muttered the man, flinging himself down above the booming uproar of the water. Below, the shags were nesting on inaccessible ledges and a solitary seal was diving through the crests of the green rollers. Byron felt unusually, inexplicably cheerful. The glories of the sunset were in keeping with his mood, a mood, as he realized, of the incoming tide. On his shelf of rock he lay in a happy dream. Hitherto he had loved nothing but a few acres of land; he had hungered after fields and rocks, had dragged out a dark existence of craving and disappointment. Now his tormented spirit was at peace. The wide expanse of heaven changed from scarlet to poppy-red, the raven clouds grew more numerous and Leadville looked on with happy eyes. In his breast was a ferment, like the unresting ferment of the sea, but neither cold nor lifeless. A wind was blowing steadily from the west, but he did not feel it for he was warm. His spirit, with its capacity for intense feeling, had crossed a boundary line, beyond which was neither heat nor cold, hunger nor thirst. He had loved Wastralls, now he was in the power of a force stronger than that love, of a force the strongest in the world.

*THE BOOK*

CHAPTER V

Mrs. Byron, wheeling her trolly through the "houses and courts" of Wastralls, along the garden paths and down the neglected drive, found that her creation had a feeling for rises in the ground that was almost uncanny. "Thus far shalt thou go," said the trolly and Jim Rosevear spent many a half-hour levelling surfaces which Mrs. Byron had hitherto believed to be as flat as the yard pond. On the whole she got about as much as she had expected to; and far more than her husband or even the hinds had believed possible.

The latter had served her well, partly because she, being a good master, it was difficult for them to do otherwise; but also because, being raised above them, a woman and unfamiliar, she was in some dim way that Golden Helen of all male dreams. For her part she understood them as she understood the animals on the farm, their idiosyncrasies, their capacity. She worked them as she worked her horses, as kindly, with as much consideration; but without feeling that they were nearer to her in the scale of creation.

On her return to Wastralls she found that her long absence and Leadville's slack rule, hard work one day, off shooting the next, had demoralized the little band. They gave their employer a hearty welcome, vicariously, proud of one who, though desperately injured, had refused to give up the struggle which is life; but it soon became evident that they believed her accident and subsequent mutilation had changed her into something weak and strange. Her orders were questioned. Unconsciously the men were testing the power that for so long had kept them subservient.

"George," said she to Biddick, one bright June morning, "you'd better cut that 'ay in Cross Parks to-day."

"I think I should leave it a day or two longer, missis. I b'lieve we're goin' to 'av some rain," returned the old fellow who, at the moment, had a job more to his liking.

Sabina's voice rang out. "Never mind about that. You get the men and 'av it done at once. It'll be done before the rain come then."

She had a sense of weather so keen that she had been known to predict it for months, even seasons, ahead and Biddick looked at her uneasily. When some days later, he came for his week's money, she spoke to him sharply.

"If you'm too old for yer work, better jack it up and I'll hire a younger man."

"I thought missis, as we was in for a lot of rain."

"I'm missis and I'll 'av things done my way."

As she once said, "Don't meet fear half-way, go all the way and you'll crush 'un in the egg!"

But although Sabina asserted herself with promptitude and decision, it was not in the old effortless way. Her health was far from satisfactory. She held her own, reduced her team to an obedience which for them was happiness, but paid for her victory in restless nights, in pain and weariness. She thought sometimes that it would be impossible for her to carry on.

"I do ache so bad," she told her faithful crony, "that I feel I shall 'av to give up and be a bed-lier."

"My dear life," said Mrs Tom, pursuing her old tactics, "'tis just what Leadville'd like for 'ee to be."

"D'yer think 'e would?"

"Iss, I'm sure 'e would, 'e'd wait on yer 'and and foot."

"I should like to see 'un then."

"I can't fancy you being a bed-lier," said Mrs. Tom comfortably. "Did Gray tell 'ee there's a piece of hedge down in the li'l medder?"

"No, she didn't." Sabina was interested. "An' I thinking to 'av the sheep turned into the lower field! I'll send Jim down this afternoon to mend'n. 'E's a good boy."

"Farmer's son and got farmin' in's veins."

"I like to see the way he wait on Gray. I should be glad for'm to live 'ere after they'm married. The way he's goin' he'll do fine. Biddick's gettin' old and Jim shall be foreman and teel Wastralls for me. He got an eye for the stock and he's a good-working li'l feller. Oh iss, Gray's a lucky maid."

Mrs. Tom did not think the suggested arrangement would prove satisfactory; but the young couple were not yet married, were not even engaged and, if Sabina could not see what was going on, it was not for others to point it out to her.

"Jim'll be agreeable," she said non-committally, "'tis all the same to him whether he go to his auntie at Gentle Jane or whether he stay 'ere. All 'e think about is Gray. Ah, my dear, I should like for 'ee to get as far as Hember and see they two sittin' together wi' us. 'Tis so good as a picture."