Chapter III: Part 3

Sabina nodded. "Leadville was only sayin' yesterday he never seen a maid so fond of 'er 'ome as Gray. Soon ever 'er work's done she's off 'ome like a bird."

"I 'ope she don't leave 'ee too much by yerself?"

"No, no, my dear, if she'd been my own daughter she couldn't do more for me," and she sighed, feeling that if Gray had been the child whose place she filled, Leadville would have been able to rest his heart content. She could see that the pseudo-relationship in which the young girl stood to him was unsatisfactory and she understood, though too vaguely to put it into words, that for people to share a home they should be bound by blood or sex.

"Well, I must do so well as I can," she added, reverting to the main topic of their wandering talk. "'Tis live from day to day and though I don't feel very special, I must be surely stronger than I was."

"Iss," said Mrs. Tom encouragingly, "I can see as each month make a difference to 'ee."

Sabina might talk of becoming a 'bed-lier,' but only the slightest spur was required to nerve her to fresh effort; and by living, as she had said, from day to day and leaning on the young strength of Gray, she won through the summer. Indeed the glooms of autumn were brightened for her by the conviction that she would live usefully and might live long. Leadville on the other hand saw his last hope fading. Dr. Derek had declared that she could not stand the shock to her system; that, if she survived, it would be as an invalid. Sabina however had the will to live and the trolly--a contrivance which Leadville both detested and contemned--carried her from kitchen to linhay and from barn to byre. Her husband looked on with growing exasperation, opposing to her good-will a sulky silence. At meal-times he sat with eyes fixed on his plate or lifted them for a quick glance at Gray. When he went out, he took his gun, the gun that hung on thongs over the kitchen door and which, as he had inherited it from old Leadville Byron, was the one possession he did not owe his wife. When he came back it was to sit in Old Squire's big chair and spend his time cleaning and oiling it. Whither he went, Sabina did not know. She sighed over his withdrawal of himself, his dull hostility, but did not lose heart. In the end Leadville, seeing that the struggle was hopeless, must return to her. What else could he do? He, too, was middle-aged and except for her was alone in the world.

Although Mrs. Byron felt sure of the ultimate issue, she had not missed the import of those quick glances when Leadville, she and Gray sat at table together. He would answer when the girl spoke and, if she were likely to be making butter or plucking chickens, would hang about and offer his help. When he brought in fish or birds it was to Gray that he took them and, in the evening, laying the gun across his knees, he would lean forward and stare at her. The wife looked on, not indulgently but with her usual robust common sense. Middle-aged men were often transiently attracted by young relatives--nieces or cousins--but the girls went to homes of their own, the old fellows forgot and no harm was done. In a better-managed world, the generations would be sharply defined and each would be sufficient unto itself. Sabina could not wonder that Leadville should prefer the delicacy of tint, the soft dewy eyes of the maid to her own stale and faded charms. She looked at herself in the glass, at her white hair, the loose skin of her neck, the fixed colour in her cheeks. She had been handsome and she had not cared. Now that wrinkles had come about her eyes she thought longingly of the pale smooth lids between which she had so contentedly surveyed her world. The mood, the regret, were new to her, an outcome of her illness and she returned before long to the old comfortable indifference. If she were in the forties so was Leadville. His figure was heavy, his face lined and weatherbeaten. Gray comparing him with Jim Rosevear could not fail to mark the contrast.

"Aunt S'bina, you been in the house all day," the girl said one evening as they sat at tea.

"Well, my dear," returned Mrs. Byron easily, "I've been busy; I had the baking to do and this afternoon I've cleaned out the rubbish your mammy put in the stair-cupboard and after that"--she smiled and looked hopefully at her husband--"I mended yer uncle's socks."

Leadville, who was cutting himself a slice of ham, threw the knife into the dish with a clatter. Why did she meddle with his clothes? He'd rather wear them all holes than have her mend them. 'Your uncle,' too! He wasn't Gray's uncle, he wasn't even her cousin. No, but--and he drifted out upon the wave that was for ever lapping about his feet.

"Do you think you can spare me? I should like to go home after tea," pursued the girl.

"Iss, my dear, I can spare yer."

"Why can't you come too, Aunt S'bina?"

"Me go up that hill? Why, you know trolly won't take the least rise in the ground."

"Well, I'll push behind."

"Don't believe you'm strong enough."

"Why not Uncle Leadville push it then?"

Byron returned from his dream to sweep a lowering glance over the little platform of shivered wood. "I'd like to see myself pushin' that thing."

"'Twould do Aunt Sabina good to have a craik with mammy."

As this was to him a matter of indifference he made no answer and Gray turned to Mrs. Byron. "Anyhow, auntie, you'll come as far as the gate with me, won't you?"

"Why, of course I will. I did last night and the night before, didn't I?" said the other innocently. From the yard gate the road was in sight as far as Hember.

"Yes and I like for you to be there. It's company till I get home."

"I'll give you my company," said Leadville abruptly, "without you askin' me for't."

Gray turned a face, from which all expression had been banished, on the speaker. "I think you better stay with Aunt S'bina."

"Oh, she don't want me," he answered, a touch of pleading in his manner.

"Iss, Leadville," said the wife tranquilly, "I'm glad for 'ee to stay in wi' me. Let the young ones go, they don't want we old 'uns followin' of them up. We've 'ad our day."

The man turned on her quickly. "Me old?" he cried with manifest irritation. "I'll tell yer about old. I bain't old."

"You'm in yer prime; but that seem old to a young maid."

"Do I seem old to you, Gray?" demanded he, and his eyes were both pleading and threatening, eyes so hungry that the girl had some ado to give him an unmoved reply. Not that she felt any sympathy with him in what she looked on as a tiresome aberration, but that under the quiet surface she was a little stirred and a little afraid. "You'm older than dad," she said at last.

"I'm ten times the man your father is!" He stretched his arms and expanded his deep chest. He was desperately anxious to prove to her his unabated virility, while she, timid, and on the threshold of awakening sensation, would have avoided the thought of it. His strength, present with her, and always desirous, was a subtle menace to the young happiness which her bosom shrined. "There isn't a feller for miles round can wrestle me or box me. You know I can carry four hundredweight on my shoulders where other chaps take two. I hain't old."

The girl, moved by her longing to escape, had risen and drawn nearer to her aunt. Here was, at least, protection, protection from all but that dim admission of her own heart that Leadville Byron was indeed all he claimed to be and more. For he was not only strong he was persistent, he was forcible. "Don't make no difference to me," she said, in a voice she tried to render careless, "whether you're old or not." And she spoke the truth. It was not his age that mattered.

When she came to Wastralls she had been prepared to find Leadville devoted to his wife's interests and deeply thankful she had been spared to him. By degrees it dawned on her simplicity that his thoughts were otherwise busy, that Sabina was a matter of indifference to him, or worse, that he was living a dream life of which she, Gray, was the centre. An unhappy little centre! She had had her share of attention from the young men of the scattered community, a little sighing, a soft pursuit, a hot word and the end. But Leadville was a stranger and his pursuit was not soft but fierce. He did not sigh but she could not be in the room with him without feeling that his brawny chest, his strong arms were aching with the longing to lay hold of her. She could not touch him accidentally without feeling the thrill of his desire. She was enveloped by his thoughts; and she struggled, resenting this emotion which threatened to overwhelm her and the bright prospects of her youth. For Gray was in need, not of a conflagration, but of a little fire upon the hearth.

With the man, matters were gradually coming to a head. He had not loved the old couple who had adopted him, he had been only mildly attracted by his wife, but he had in him a fund of passion which, through the fallow years, had been growing in concentration and of which the fuse had at length been lighted. His love for Gray was as overwhelming to himself as it might prove to its object. He had not known what a furnace was smouldering at the heart of him and, when the flame broke forth, to resist was impossible. He did not attempt it. On the contrary he gave himself up to these new sensations that ran through him, wave after wave, like a burning but not scarifying fire. His new passion pushed Wastralls for the time being into the background. He could not contain more than one absorbing emotion. He had been the persistent, passionate lover of the land, so but with more fever, did he love Gray. Wonderful as to him were these new feelings, he found them almost too poignant. When she entered a room in which he sat his throat went dry, he could hardly speak and the brief contacts of skirt or hand proved unendurably sweet. He turned from these moments of a troubling ecstasy to the languorous long intervals when she was absent and he, recalling her face, could dwell on it and imagine the fulfilling, tender, fiery, wonderful, of his every hope.

During the first months that Gray was living at Wastralls, Byron spent much of his time on Dark Head; but in the end he woke to a desire for more than dreams could give, a desire which grew in intensity after the manner of Jack the Giant-killer's bean. He began to haunt the young girl's steps and her honest attempts to discourage him passed with him for a sort of tantalizing encouragement. He could not believe that the object of a feeling so intense could be unresponsive, that these troubling sensations were not mutual; and when Gray avoided him, escaped from him, even, when protected by Sabina, flouted him with a little angry ruffling, he smiled with the conviction that his hour was at hand.

Steady untiring pursuit is apt to demoralize the victim and while Sabina thought the summer heats had washed the colour out of Gray's cheek, Mrs. Tom, uneasy as a hen when hawks are hovering, went to the root of the matter.

"Do 'ee like being to Wastralls, Gray?" she asked that evening when, having left Sabina stationed at the yard gate, the girl had run up the road, to arrive breathless and panting.

"Oh yes, mammy, I do dearly love Aunt S'bina."

"Why was you runnin' so just now?"

Gray hesitated. Very few girls confide such matters to a mother's ear. Experience shall not teach. Each generation will make its own mistakes and gather its handful of treasures and keep its secrets. Gray was however very doubtful and unhappy and, having no girl of her own age to consult, she turned to her mother.

"It's Uncle Leadville. He's always wanting to come with me and I don't want'n. I dunno--" she paused.

"Iss?" said Mrs. Tom quietly.

"I dunno as Jim'll be agreeable."

"My dear, why don't you wear the ring that 'e give you?"

"I don't know, I don't like to. I"--she smiled anxiously, yet with a glimmering of humour--"I don't believe Uncle Leadville would like to see me wearin' a ring."

Having said so much, Gray was willing to make further admissions. "I feel afraid of Unde Leadville, he's always after me and his eyes seem to be watching me as if they was coming out of his sockets. I can't sleep by night, mammy, I--I'm always thinking about him and," she looked shyly away, unable in this moment of revelation to meet her mother's understanding eye, "I don't want to, I'm--" her voice sank, "I'm afraid."

"'Tis a shame," said Mrs. Tom warmly. She knew how compelling are strength and intensity but thought it wisest not to let her knowledge appear. The susceptibilities of young people are easily ruffled.

"I think it's wicked of him, mammy." She was righteously indignant that he should be making life so difficult, "and auntie is so good to him."

"Iss," sighed the matron, "but men's so, they can't help theirselves--poor old villains. Why don't you come 'ome with me for a bit and leave Richbell go down with your auntie?"

Gray's face brightened hopefully, then she shook her head. "I don't think Aunt S'bina would like it."

"Well, I'll talk to yer auntie about it an' tell 'er what I think."

"Don't you say nothing about what I've told you," cried youth, anxious as to the discretion of gossiping middle-age.

"You can trust me," and Gray, looking into the kind shrewd face, felt that she might.

"You know she see Uncle Leadville's tiresome but she don't think he mean anything."

"Poor sawl, no she wouldn't, of course, bein' 'is wife. He'll say one thing to she an' another thing to you."

Gray nodded. That was the way of it.

"And she'll believe what 'e say."

"He'd tell her I was making a fuss about nothing. Yes, he would."

"There's Jim comin' up the road," said Mrs. Tom, who was sitting by the window; "I wonder 'e and Leadville get on."

"They don't see but very little of each other. If I was to be with Jim when Uncle Leadville come, I believe they'd fight; and the fear of that keeps me on pins and needles when I'm with Jim. It's all horrid."

"Well, dearie, I'll see what I can do with yer auntie. 'Twould be better if you could say as you was engaged to Jim, but I suppose you can't?"

"I daren't, mammy." Her large eyes, softly black, filled with tears. Courting-time is April weather but Gray felt that more showers than sunshine were falling to her share. "I'm frightened of Uncle Leadville and his old gun. We often say we'll do things but we don't after all; I got an idea he would."

Mrs. Tom took from behind the door a purple knitted bonnet and a cloak. The evenings were dark and the wind from the sea cold. She did not stay to take off her apron but went as she was, in her dark gown and with her kind face bright between the flaps of the woollen bonnet.

Sabina, lonely, because the husband who should have been sitting opposite to her at the end of the day was gone out, gave her a warmer greeting than was her wont. She was tired and the peace and good-fellowship to which she was looking forward seemed long in coming. She, also, would be glad of a chat.

*CHAPTER VI*

"She've a whisht 'eart, poor Gray 'as," said the mother in deprecation of Mrs. Byron's stout advice that the maid should wear her ring openly and tell Leadville to go hang.

"Whatever is she 'fraid of?"

"Oh, I dunno, maids is like that sometimes."

"She needn't be afraid of Leadville, 'e 'edn't goin' do nothing."

"I don't say 'e 'av so far," was the cautious reply.

The wife laughed. "You don't think I've lived with'n all these years an' don't know 'e's all blow?"

But Mrs. Tom knew just how much justification there was for Gray's alarm. "Well, you know, Gray's easily frightened," she said thoughtfully. "I don't believe she'd come down the lane at night for all the gold in Tregols."

"Well, I never. Whatever is there to be afraid of?"

"You know she 'ad a bit of a shock one night."

"She didn't say a word about it to me, then."

"Well no, I s'pose she didn't like to."

"Whatever was it, then?"

"I don't think she 'ud like for me to say anything about it."

Mrs. Tom had successfully aroused her friend's curiosity and Sabina clapped her arm impatiently. "I'm sure Gray wouldn't mind you tellin' me of't."

"No, p'raps she wouldn't, still 'tis a awkward thing to say to 'ee."

"Never mind for that. I reckon I can listen to what you can say."

"Well, my dear." Mrs. Tom hitched her chair nearer to the trolly and lowered her voice. "Jim 'ad gone over to Treketh to see his mother and the maid was to home and she wouldn't leave 'er father see 'er back 'ere, said she'd be all right by 'erself. An' as she was comin' along, something rustled in the 'edge. 'Twas one of they dark nights and she couldn't see, but she thought 'twas a bullock."

"Iss?" Sabina's mind, by now ready for it, leaped to the natural conclusion. Leadville was trying to meet Gray on the quiet.

"And some one springed out and catched 'old of er and just about pulled the clothes off 'er back, they did," was Mrs. Tom's startling end to the story.

"My dear life! You don't mean to say so?" This was worse than she had feared; presented her, indeed, with a new and surprising view of her husband.

"I dunno 'owever she got away from 'im."

"Isolda!" and the fixed colour of her cheeks was a dull red patch on the pallor, "you don't mean to say that 'twas really 'im? You can't mean 'twas?"

"Oh, my dear, don't 'e ask me."

"I can't 'ardly believe," said the wife miserably, "that 'e'd do such a thing. 'E's always been a good-livin' feller, 'e don't drink and 'e never seemed to be after the maidens. Can't think," she said, surrendering the point as proven, "whatever ail the man."

The fact that Leadville was capable of using violence to gain his ends had sunk into Mrs. Tom's mind. She was like an old hen when a hawk is in the blue. "I don't want to keep Gray 'ome," she said uneasily, "but if Leadville worry the life out of 'er..."

Mrs. Byron had rallied from her consternation. At the bottom of her heart she preserved a little doubt. The story was perhaps substantially true, true enough to show in which direction the wind was blowing; but Gray, being a timid maid, the tale had not lost in the telling.

"'Tis a pack o' tommy-rot," she said at last, anger beginning to colour her unhappy amazement, "a man of his years runnin' after young maidens; but once Gray's married 'e won't think no more about it. 'Tis disgraceful of him; and, what's more, 'tis madness for'm to think she's goin' to 'av anything to do wi' an old man like 'e. Isolda, I do think 'tis time Gray was married."

"Iss, my dear, so do I."

"Well--why don't they?"

"It mean a good bit o' money to get married, you know," said Mrs. Tom who, in spite of her alert mind, was not capable of quick decisions, "and one thing more, marrying isn't horse-jocking."

"Why don't they put the banns in and get married on the quiet?"

The other went off on a side issue. "You know," she said, uttering her thoughts aloud, "Leadville's bound to know one day."

"If Gray was to walk in one morning and say 'I'm married,'" continued Mrs. Byron, "what could 'e do then? 'E'd 'av to 'old 'is tongue."

The thought of Gray doing anything so bold brought a smile to the mother's lips. "I'm sure she wouldn't do that, S'bina."

"Well, p'raps she wouldn't." Mrs. Byron had realized that her friend, in revealing the incident of the lane, had meant to convey a warning. The aunt did not wish to have Gray replaced by the handsome more noisy Richbell and yet... "I feel I belong to speak to Leadville about it," she said reluctantly. "But I don't want for'n to think I'm always watchin' 'im." The little doubt as to his having been as guilty as Isolda would have her think, had grown. She could not believe his jumping out of the hedge had been more than a trick, a practical joke. Gray, in her alarm, must have magnified it. These inexperienced girls were as easily frightened as a sheep! A way out of the difficulty occurred to her. "My dear, 'ow would it be if Leonora was to come and stay for a few days?"

Mrs. Tom thought that Sabina was only postponing the reckoning which in the long run she would be bound to make, but aloud she gave consent.

"Well, Leonora can come for a bit and see 'ow they get on, but she'd 'av to sleep 'ome. She'd better come down early in the mornin', for 'tis breakfast-time, when you'm in bed, that Leadville torment Gray."

"Every month," said Sabina hopefully, "I feel I shall soon be able to get up early in the mornin's; by spring, I'm sure I shall be able to."

"I hope by that time, please God," said Mrs. Tom, getting up to go, "the maid will be married."

She felt it would be as well for Gray to have the protection of a man, in love with her and constantly at her side and, as she went uphill between the November hedges, she considered what she should tell her husband. Tom was a peaceable and cautious man, but his blood was hot. The wife wondered whether he would be willing for Gray to be married quietly? A good deal depended on the girl. Since the time, as a little child, that she had fallen into the pail of boiling pig's meal and they had nearly lost her, she had been her father's pet. If he understood that she was unhappy and that Leadville was the cause, he would be certain to make himself unpleasant. Mrs. Tom did not wish to stir up strife.

Leonora, when told she was to spend her days at Auntie Sabina's, shook back her curls and declared herself delighted. One of a big household she knew the stint of comparatively narrow means and a change would be welcome. Before Gray was out of her aunt's room the following morning, impatient fingers were rattling at the handle of the porch; and Leadville, stealing down as usual in his stockinged feet, heard with surprise a sound of voices in the kitchen. He stared when Leonora came from the linhay carrying hog's pudding and a frying-pan.

"I've come to breakfast," she said, smiling up at him with bright and friendly eyes, "and I be comin' every morning. I like comin' 'ere. Aunt S'bina says I shall be company for Gray and I dearly love 'og's puddin', Uncle Leadville, don't you?"

Leadville's tortured spirit was in the gaze he turned from the busy child to her sister. Was he to lose the hour with Gray which had been the solace of lonely night and empty day, the one hour out of the twenty-four that was his? He did not answer Leonora but looked his anxious question. Was Gray at the bottom of this? But no, she could not be. It was a scheme of Sabina's, of Mrs. Tom's, or simple accident.

Drawing Old Squire's big elbow-chair up to the table he took his customary seat. Leonora chattered of school, of the little pigs that had had to be killed because they had worms, such dear little pigs, all black; and Gray served the breakfast. Leadville, sitting opposite to her, drank in her morning freshness and looked forward to the time when this flower should be blooming for him.

A voice called from the Justice Room and Leonora jumped up. "I'll see what auntie wants."

"No, dear, I'll go."

"Leave 'er go," rumbled Leadville in his compelling bass and she was off on the wings of happy service. He stared resentfully after the flying figure. "What's she doin' 'ere?"

Gray's heart was aflutter. "I miss the children so."

His eyes grew tender. "You do want a nest of your own, my bird. I can see you in it, a li'l place away from 'ere."

She shook her head, repudiating the idea with courage born of her sister's nearness. "I don't want never to leave Trevorrick and mammy, and any of them."

"You'd 'av so much of your own things to think about," he murmured, his mind full of the nest he would build for her, "you wouldn't 'av time to think upon 'ome."

Before she could answer, Leonora was back. "'Tis you auntie want, Gray."

Suspicion flamed in Leadville's eye. "If they're schemin' to come between us," he said angrily, "they'd better look out. Don't you go, Gray."

But the girl, running on light feet down the long dark passage, was glad to escape. When Uncle Leadville looked at her like that, she had ever a fluttered feeling that she must run away, or something, she knew not what, but something terrible, would happen. Instinct was warning her, instinct that is wiser even than experience and Leadville might sit on in the kitchen, waiting and waiting, but until he was gone, Gray would not return.

*CHAPTER VII*

The year ran mildly down to Christmas, but the wind with its tang of cold did not fling a rose into Gray's cheek or buffet her into keener life and, when again the friends met in council, it was to discuss changes which both saw to be necessary.

"Jim's taking the cart into Stowe, week before Christmas," said Mrs. Byron when they had talked the matter over, "to bring 'ome some coals and flour. P'raps that day'll suit Gray?"

"Well, I'll talk to 'er and see what she got to say."

"Very well then, Friday before Christmas."

"And you'll 'av Richbell till you see 'ow things turn out?"

"Iss. She growin' to a fine maid. They'm all pretty but Richbell's got the best colour. 'Tis lovely an' I don't wonder the boys is maaeze about 'er. Still," she sighed, "give me Gray."

"We all know Gray's the favourite here," smiled Mrs. Tom, sticking her needles into the stocking she was knitting and looking round for her cloak. "Well, I think we'm doing the best we can, seein' Leadville's so teasy."

"He'll settle down right enough now. 'Tedn't as if 'e was a young man. When 'e do realize 'e's out of the running, 'e'll take it quiet and we'll be all comfortable again."

"Well, my dear, I hope we shall. It 'as been a draggin' time for 'ee since you was laid up."

"'Tis funny," said Sabina, "'ow you think 'Now that's over and done with,' but 'tedn't. I thought 'Once I'm out of 'ospital I'll soon put things to rights,' but I 'aven't done it yet."

"Takes time, my dear."

"Iss, and time's life."

Leadville had become so remote and unapproachable that Sabina did not find an opportunity to tell him the wagon would be going into Stowe the Friday before Christmas and that Gray would be taking fowls, cream and butter, to the market. Not even when the day dawned did he realize that anything unusual was afoot. He had come down to breakfast, stared with sullen aversion at Leonora, as the cheerful child ran to and fro between kitchen and linhay; and sought in his uninventive mind for expedients which should leave him alone with her sister for a blessed few minutes. He did this morning after morning, sometimes successfully; but generally, as Gray wished to keep the child near her, without its making much difference. On this particular day Leonora, chattering of Christmas festivities, the tree they were to have at the chapel on New Year's Eve, the tea the following day, was eventually seen off to school and Gray, turning a deaf ear to Leadville's plea that she would linger, went candle in hand, for the sun was still below the eastern hill, to Sabina's room. Her mind was brimful of the practicalities of the day in Stowe. She had no time for Byron, had forgotten even the fear with which his hungry presence was wont to inspire her, was only conscious of the many things to be done before she could change her workaday raiment for clothes befitting the occasion.

To Leadville all seemed as usual, though Gray was perhaps unusually full of domestic business but, as Christmas was the following week, that was to be expected. He heard her low singing voice in the Justice Room as she flitted about, tidying the place, putting what Sabina needed ready to her hand; and he decided to smoke his morning pipe in the yard. He enjoyed looking on critically while the men worked. He told himself that if he had been master they would have done as much again. He had said so to Sabina more than once and she had smiled, thinking that she knew better.

As he watched them that morning, idly content with the fine weather and with his heart momentarily at rest, he called to mind that on the previous day he had seen a seal sporting in the surf beyond Morwen Cove. The end of an Atlantic gale had been lashing the cliff-face and a procession of monstrous waves had been rolling in out of the grey distance. In that welter of far-sounding sea, the living atom had been at play; and Byron, detecting the springing shadow in the curl of a wave, the dark speck in the racing tide of the Mad Rip, had reflected that the last bottle of seal-oil had been sold. Remembering this, he had thought the opportunity good and, returning to the kitchen, had lifted his gun from the leathern thong above the door. The room still lay in obscurity, the only light being that of the frugal banked-up fire. Long handling, however, had given the gun-butt a bright dark polish which reflected the faint glow, and Leadville's hand had gone out instinctively. Crossing the kitchen to the wall-cupboard on the right of the slab range he took out the ammunition of which he stood in need. Some empty bottles, not over-clean, stood on the top shelf, bottles which were to hold the fresh supply of seal-oil, a medicine for stock with which he did a trade among the farmers of the neighbouring valleys. Already Treherne Gaskis had sent once to ask for a pint. As Byron slipped the pouch into his pocket, a sound broke the stillness which lay like dust over the rooms.

"When the wind is off the hill
Flows the water to the mill..."

sang a voice in the linhay and, though West-country birds sing sweetly, they cannot compare for music with West-country maidens. This voice, though without much volume, had a tender, joyous note as of one singing out of a full heart and Leadville hardly recognized it as Gray's. A narrow gleam of candle-light, edged the dark oblong of the door and, from beyond, came the brisk slap-smack of a beater upon newly made butter.

As the man stood to listen, a look, human, eager, almost happy, broke like a shining over his swarthy face. The seal-hunt was forgotten, for the voice singing of the rain had a thrill in it, the thrill of a love-call and the man's wild heart was assured the call was for him.

For a moment, the habit of years reasserting itself, he glanced at the door on the other side of the kitchen. At the end of the long dark passage his wife still lay abed, or so he hoped. The swift glance had been unintentional, the drag of a chain from which he was about to free himself. He threw back his head, the brooding night of his deep-set eyes quickened by emotion and, laying the gun on the table among the breakfast crocks, pushed farther open the door of the linhay.

This room, at once the scullery, larder and dairy of the house, was high and narrow, with a sloping roof. A pump stood by the outer door, and the place was lighted from above; but, as the dawn had not broken, Gray was butter-making by the light of a candle. The living jewel of flame illumined faintly the high and shadowy place, was reflected from the tiny surfaces of the wet butter and, outlining Gray's figure of a young and happy maid, shone on her absorbed face. The butter had "come" quickly. She struck it with the heavy beater until the milk ran soundingly into the pail below and, as she worked, she sang in that voice of infinite allure,

"When the wind is off the land
It brings the weed on to the sand."

For some time Leadville, aware that his self-control was limited, had been trying to get Gray to himself. Like a wisp of blossomy tamarisk swaying in the bright upper air, however, she remained tantalizingly out of reach. He spent himself in the attempt to lay hands on her, to force her to hear his suit; but Sabina's presence was for ever being thrust between him and his objective, until between fury with his wife and baulked desire, the man was in a dangerous mood. His highly strung temperament prevented his being able to seize opportunity by the forelock; but so often had he met with disappointment, grasping shadows in place of a woman that, when he realized Gray was alone and ignorant of his proximity, he obeyed for once a natural prompting. Stepping quickly across the linhay, he threw his arms round the busy girl and sought her lips.

To his almost incredulous joy, Gray did not offer any resistance. He had come up behind, had taken her strongly in his arms and the soft young body yielded as if his coming had been in answer to her own unexpressed desire. Though the month was December, spring was in the air and with an unmistakable murmur of content, Gray abandoned herself. He bent to hers a transfigured face and then, but not till then, did she realize she was in Leadville Byron's arms.

Her body stiffened suddenly and, uttering a cry of horror, she began to struggle. "You!" she cried and made a frantic effort to escape. So surprised was he by this change of front that, with his mood in the balance between love and rage, he let her go.

"My little umuntz," he cried, "don't 'ee play with me." A moment before she had yielded herself, her voice had been liquid with invitation, he had heard in it the mating note. Now she stared at him from a safe distance with a spark in her soft eye.

"If you don't leave me alone," she said angrily, "I shall go home and never put foot inside this door no more, whiles you're here."

Byron stood with his head bent. He too was angry. He felt defrauded. Only a moment since she had lain in his embrace, thrilled by his touch, a warm and palpitating woman. Now she spoke as if her heart were virgin.

"Don't 'ee play with me," he said again. "I couldn't bear it, I've 'ad as much as I can stand. 'Ee knaw I love 'ee."

"I--I don't--I don't want to."

"Don't want to? Don't want to know that night after night I can't sleep for thinking of 'ee?" He struck his chest with a strong blunt-fingered hand. "Here's your place, love, and my arm'll ache till I 'old 'ee again."

Hot colour dyed her face. To think that she should have lain in his arms! On that day, too, of all the days in the year, of all the days in a lifetime! "'Tis all a mistake."

"The day'll come when you'll worship the ground I tread on."

"No--never."

"I'll make 'ee love me. I loved 'ee from the first day you come 'ere. I've never wanted nobody but you and I've wanted 'ee ever since I did see your 'andsome face about Wastralls and heard you singin', 'appy as a greybird. Wastralls an' you, they go together in my mind. I love 'ee, Gray, and you know what that means to a man like me, what cares for nobody and nothing. I'm eaten up with the love of you. I'd do anything to get 'ee. I must 'av 'ee and I will 'av 'ee." He came a step nearer, but she drew back.

"Leave me alone, leave me alone."

"Leave 'ee alone? I want to be kissin' of 'ee all the day."

The girl was trembling. She leant one arm upon the stone slab behind her, and the shock of its coldness was a steadying influence. "I bain't gwine let you kiss me. I'd rather slap yer face for yer. What d'yer think then?"

He coaxed her tenderly. "Bain't I worth 'avin' then?"

"I bain't gwine 'av nothing to do with 'ee. I wouldn't 'ave 'ee for the world." Taking up one of the butter pats she began mechanically shaping the mass.

"What's the matter with me that you won't 'av nothing to do with me?" Straightening himself, he opened out unusually broad shoulders and the candlelight revealed a face of black shadows and strong saliences. How strong, how ruthless, how confident he looked! Gray felt her old fear returning, she could not believe that this strange man would be held in check by any of the received standards.

"You'm married and old enough to be my father."

She clinched the matter: "You'm married to Aunt S'bina."

He laughed contemptuously. "Ah, but you would 'av me, if I was a widower, a widower wi' Wastralls for my own."

Putting down the pat, Gray turned at that in a sudden ruffle of indignation.

"Take an' 'old your tongue," she commanded. "I'm ashamed of 'ee to talk like that."

"Well," he persisted, only anxious for her to realize that he meant to make her mistress of all he hoped for in life--Wastralls. "I may be before long. I don't believe the missis'll live very long."

"I hate that kind of talk!"

Her anger, a spark in the dark eye, a flush on the soft cheek, became her and he stared admiringly. Her wrath was like the peck of a captive bird and, whatever she might say, from henceforth she would know that his pursuing love was no light matter. "I do love 'ee so," he pleaded, his voice dropping to an intimate compelling whisper. "I tremble when you come into the room. But I can't set 'ere and not touch 'ee; I 'ave to go out on cliff 'till I've walked it down. Seems sometimes at night as if you was near me and I put out my 'and--ah, if you was there I should die of joy. You'm mine and I've waited so long. I can't bear it. I can't eat or drink or sleep. I'm in a fever and I ache with longing for 'ee till I feel as if I should go mad----"

Gray caught her breath in a sob, as a soft trundling sound came from the next room. Unable to speak she pointed shakily at the door.

Leadville also heard the sound, a scrooping noise as of rubber-tyred wheels being turned about. Sabina was in the kitchen, could hear every word, would probably, in another minute, roll herself in at the linhay door. His face grew savage and rage rose in a black flood about his heart. Was it to be always like this, was this poor remnant of humanity, feeble, distorted, ageing, always to come between him and Gray? His mind grew blurry with a wild spindrift of menace. Green withes or new ropes, fools to think he could be bound by either law or convention, he whom only the lustreless black hair of one woman might hold. Love had come late, but it had come in overwhelming force and he would break every convention, every law that stood in his way! Laws?

As he stood, stricken dumb by his wife's nearness, but on the edge of passionate revolt he became conscious of a peculiar change in his surroundings. Silence fell, a thick silence like a wall, a silence that shut out the cackle of a hen in the yard and the distant baa-ing that came irregularly from the hillside. The man was alone behind this wall of soundlessness, shut away by it from the homely noises of the indoor and the out. When it had lasted for a bewildering second, it was succeeded by a faint far-off sound. The sound came out of a red distance and grew rapidly louder, resolving itself at last into the regular tap-tap of a hammer which is being used for knocking in nails. This hammering was to Byron a familiar sound. It had been heard by him at other times of stress and strain, at other moments when raging passions seemed about to drive him over some dark verge. The sound was arresting. It went as he well knew with flashes of vision, during which he would see a piece of light wood and the glint of brass-headed tacks. As the wood appeared out of the white mist which surrounded him, Byron passed into another state of consciousness. His mind, abruptly disconnected, was filled with a queer eagerness and curiosity. His wife, Gray, Wastralls, everything, were momentarily forgotten. What was it, this knocking? No carpenter was at work in the houses and courts; and the wood too, a full curve narrowing to an angle, was a curious shape. He stared about him, seeking an explanation and his eye fell on the girl at her work.

"Did you 'ear?" he said, turning on her a face from which the tide of emotion had ebbed.

Gray, thankful for the respite which had followed her aunt's entry, had seized the pats and, with feverish industry was cutting pounds and half pounds off the mass of butter.

"I heard Aunt S'bina in the kitchen," she answered coldly.

"I wasn't speaking of 'er. I meant the knockin'."

"What knocking?"

"I didn't know as the mason was comin' to-day to put up the new pigs' 'ouse?"

"He isn't coming till after Christmas."

"Well, I'm sure I 'eard some one 'ammerin' in nails."

She shook her head. "I didn't hear it."

The noise of dishes being piled together on the breakfast table caught Byron's attention. He glanced at Gray and the sight of youth, with a blush on the hot cheek, a suggestion of tears on the long lashes, was to him as the opening of a door. He came out of his preoccupation and the knocking either died away or was forgotten. Forgotten, too, were his rage and disappointment.

"What's she doin' out o' bed so early for?"

"I'm going into Stowe with the butter and there's a lot to do."

"'Oo yer gwine with?" asked Byron, instantly on the alert.

"With Jim."

"You needn't go." He was reluctant to have her out of his reach, even for a morning. He wanted her at home under his eye. He was going to renew his pleading as soon as the moment was auspicious. "Rosevear can take that in."

"I want to go to-day."

His mind examined the statement with that ever-ready fear of the lover who is uncertain of his standing. "What you want to go for?"

"Shopping!" said she and, with a smile that was faintly malicious, enumerated the items, groceries, liniment for her aunt, pitchers, cloam pans.

"Shopping?" But what he saw was that five-mile drive over Big Hill into Stowe. He saw her beside Jim, driving away from Wastralls, from him. "I'll drive 'ee in!"

Gray's heart sank and she remained silent.

"Would 'ee like me to?"

If she said 'No,' he would be all the more eager. "Once I'm in Stowe I shall be that busy you wouldn't see anything of me."

He laughed. "I'd take care of that. All right then, 'tis I as'll drive 'ee into Stowe and not the lad. I'll not trust Rosevear to drive 'ee, I'll do it myself." He looked back at her from the door, his dark face alight. "My God, if I caught 'ee with one of they, I'd--I'd break his neck."

The door banged to behind him, and Gray putting down the printer laid her head on her arms. If Aunt Sabina should not be able to prevent him!

But Aunt Sabina was a tower of strength.

*CHAPTER VIII*

In order that Gray might start for the market in good time, Mrs. Byron had swung herself out of bed that morning as soon as she had swallowed her simple breakfast of tea and buttered split. But though she had brush, comb, garments, in fact all toilet necessaries at hand, and could therefore dress expeditiously, she found when she reached the kitchen that day was breaking. A red sun, having topped the south-easterly slopes of Brown Willy and Rowtor, was smiling in at the many-paned window and winning an answering brightness from surfaces of steel, of yellow glaze and of glass. Mrs. Byron's eye as she pushed the trolly into the room took in the homely details. To the right of the range yawned a cloam oven and, before long, Jim Rosevear would be bringing faggots of tamarisk wood with which to fill it. Before the fire in a deep pan the dough was 'plumping' under a linen cloth, and nothing makes a house so homely as dough on a low chair 'plumping' in kitchen warmth and stillness. As she gathered the breakfast crocks together, preparatory to cleansing them, she smiled to herself well-pleased. Her plans were working smoothly and although the past year had been one of change and discomfort, she could believe that the disturbance, like yeast in flour, would bring good results. Mrs. Byron's movements were still quick and deft. She set the remains of the fry aside, poured hot water into the wooden tub for washing up and stood the knives, blade down, in a pot. The trolly, being of cane and shivered wood, ran lightly over the blue flags; but as she turned from putting the refilled kettle on the fire she heard voices in the linhay, the deep bass murmur that was her husband's and a clearer sound, the voice of some one young and troubled, of some one angered, but also afraid.

The smile died off Mrs. Byron's lips and for some minutes she stared unseeingly at the steaming water in the round wooden bowl. So he was at his tricks, the old villain! She had taken the matter lightly as a vagary, a passing fancy: but as the sound of his voice fell upon her ears she experienced a doubt, the first real doubt that she had known. In these tones there was a passion wholly new to her. It shook the wife's heart with fear, the fear of ultimate irremediable loss; with such fear, that for the moment she went sick and faint and leaned perilously forward in the cone of her trolly.

In the linhay, the voices dropped into silence and, when they began again, they were pitched in a more commonplace key. Sabina, sitting by the table, stunned by a late realization of what had happened, heard a well-known step, a pause and the utterance in quick, fierce tones, of some threatening phrase. Upon that, Leadville came quickly into the kitchen.

"S'bina," he said and she noticed with a fresh pang that his face wore a warm and eager look, a look of happy anticipation, "I want the money for they veares."

The year's pigs had been made into hams and bacon and Mrs. Byron, discussing the matter with old George, had decided not to buy young animals--veares or slips--until the New Year. She could not understand why Leadville should want to restock the empty sties. What was it to do with him?

"Pigs," she said non-committally, "'ull be cheaper after Christmas."

"They won't go down again."

"I know they will. You can get good-sized slips after Christmas for less money than you'll give for veares now."

He thrust his hands into empty pockets and tried to think of another way in which he could procure money. How could he take Gray into Stowe if he had none? He wanted to give her pretty things, to spend on her, to impress her: but he could not ask the one woman for money to throw away on the other. "Ah," said he, "but I can go to-day and get them and after Christmas I shan't be able to."

Only then did Mrs. Byron remember the errand upon which Gray was bound, the errand which was taking her into Stowe. She smiled and a tinge of malice crept into her thoughts.

"It bain't often as you're so keen to do things for us," she said, "and I didn't know as you'd time to spare."

"Iss, I can spend the day in buyin' they veares for 'ee and welcome."

"There's things as I want more'n veares. Wi' the wind off the land there'll be a pretty lot of oreweed in the bay. You might give a hand to that."

"I been down and there 'edn't a bit in."

She knew that he had not been farther than the yard that morning. "I don't say 'no' to a fair offer," she said, her upper lip lifting a little over the still white and regular teeth. "They turmits want bringin' in from the Willows Field, else the rabbits will eat'n all."

"I 'eard Biddick say as 'e was goin' after'm to-day." He had a habit of shifting his weight from one foot to the other, as he stood, and it gave him an appearance of restlessness, as if at any moment he might start off on some errand. "I don't want to bother with oreweed or turmits. I'm going into Stowe and I thought you might like for me to get the pigs. Come, leave me 'av some money."

"I don't want they veares." She rested her strong hands on the sides of the cone and looked at him with understanding. He must be made to realize that this was folly and that it must come to an end. "An' you don't want to buy them. All you want is to go with Gray."

Leadville, as always when his subterfuges were detected, fell back on the truth.

"Well?" he said. "An' s'posin' if I did?"

Sabina was startled. Had matters gone so far that he no longer had the decency to deny his feelings? "Isolda's goin' wi' Gray," she said, with a shrug of her plump shoulders.

"Isolda?" he said and his disappointment, bubbling up from the depths, showed as anger. Among them they took good care of Gray; but if they thought their scheming and underhauling would prevent his reaching her, he would very soon show them they were mistaken. "Fine thing you," he cried wrathfully, "to be jealous over a feller."

Mrs. Byron had grown stouter since her long illness. She filled the wicker cone to overflowing, a big rosy woman with abundance of white hair above a face the strength of which time had made plain. Her husband's thrust was shrewd, so shrewd that she gave way before it. "You'm wishin' me daid, I s'pose?" she said bitterly and waited to hear him deny the accusation.

Leadville shifted from one foot to the other but did not speak. People say terrible things when they are angry, but silence can be more terrible than speech.

"I shen't die any quicker," cried poor Mrs. Byron, "for you wishin' of it."

For months the man had concealed his feelings behind down-dropped lids and avoidance; but now the repugnance with which she filled him rose to his eyes, eyes no longer moody and dull, but suddenly, revealingly, alive. Hitherto the secrecy which was natural to him had seemed the only possible plan; now, driven by jealousy, by anger, by a mounting hatred, he suddenly discarded it. Raising his lids he stared at Sabina for some seconds and his soul showed her its loathing and threatened her and condemned her; and--like a rabbit held by lanthorn light--she stared back.

The truth was riding nakedly through the street of life. It spoke with a clear note of warning and Sabina--for a moment--both saw and heard.

*CHAPTER IX*