"Capital, Thomas," said Mr. Stockman. "Never heard your tongue flow so suent afore. You go on and say all you feel called to say, then I'll answer you, if you'll allow me."
"That's all," answered Palk. "And I hope all well inside civility and my place. And, as man to man, I do pray you won't be put about nor yet feel I've said a word beyond my duty."
Joe appeared quite unangered and indeed only mildly interested. He sipped at his glass; then lighted his pipe and drew at it for half a minute before he replied.
"Every man has a right to do and say what he feels to be his duty, Thomas. And women likewise. It's a free country in fact—or so we pretend—and I should be very sorry to think as you, or Maynard, or the boy even, was bound to endure my tyrant manners and customs a minute longer than your comfort could put up with 'em. But that cuts both ways, don't it? An all-seeing eye like yours will grant that?"
"I ain't got an all-seeing eye, master. 'Tis only the point of view. And of course we could go if we was wishful to go, which we are not I'm sure. But a man's daughter be different. She can't go very well, can she?"
"She cannot," admitted Mr. Stockman. "And I've yet to hear she's fretting to do so. This place is her home, and she's stood at her father's right hand ever since he was doomed to widowhood. And I may be wrong, of course, but I've always laboured under the opinion she loved her parent and was proud and pleased to be the crown of his grey hairs. She can't well desert me, as you say. But in your case, Thomas, the position is a bit otherwise. You can go when you please, or when I please. 'Tis well within your power to seek other work, where your kind heart won't be torn watching a daughter do her duty by a sick father; and 'tis well within my power to wish you to go. And I do wish it. I'm wishing it something tremendous this moment."
Mr. Stockman smiled genially and continued.
"In a word, fine chap that you are and a willing worker, with good methods and worthy of my praise—which you've had—I'm going to get along without you now, and so we'll part Monday month, if you please. And delighted I shall be to give you a right down good character for honesty and sound understanding—where the hosses are concerned."
Mr. Palk had not expected this. He was much bewildered.
"D'you mean it, master?" he asked, with eyes not devoid of alarm.
"I do, my dear. I never meant anything with a better appetite. A great loss, because with one like me—old and stricken before my time, along of working far too hard, which was a foolish fault in my generation—it was a comforting thing to feel I'd got a hossman in you worthy of the name. You be the pattern of a good, useful sort, that's dying out—worse luck. But when you said you wasn't a nosey-poker, Thomas, you said wrong, I'm afraid; and a meddlesome man, that has time to spare from the hosses for the women, and thrusts in between parent and child, be very much against the grain with me. And though, of course, you may be quite right, and know better how to treat and cherish a grown-up daughter than a stupid creature like me—and you a bachelor—yet even the worm will turn, Thomas. And, worm though I am, I be going to venture to turn. You're great on the point of view; and so will I be: and, from my point of view, I can see you haven't got enough work to do in this little place. You must go in the world and find a bigger and a harder job, that won't leave you time for other people's business, which at best be a kicklish task and avoided by men of much wits as a rule."
"I meant well, master."
"And don't you always mean well? Why, you're the most well-meaning man, after myself, I ever had the luck to meet, Thomas. But you've fixed a gulf to-day, and I feel terrible sure we shan't suit each other no more. So we'll part friends Monday month."
Joe spoke with far greater cordiality than when raising Mr. Palk's wages six weeks before. He beamed graciously on Thomas and lighted his pipe again.
"The talk be at an end now, because I mustn't strain my tubes," he said. "And I'll beg you not to return to the subject. Both me and my God are very well satisfied with the way I brought up Soosie-Toosie, and so's she; and if she feels there's anything on this earth I can do for her, to make her home a happier place, rest assured she'll ax me herself. She's my master-jewel and always will be, though she'll never know all I've done for her, because no child ever can know the heights and depths of a good father's love. 'A good father,' mark me, Thomas."
"Monday month then, master?"
"If quite convenient to yourself."
Then Palk went out into storm and gathering dusk. The woods of Buckland waved grey through the gloaming and rain swept them heavily. The wind shouted over the granite crown of the Beacon; sheep and cattle had crept down from the high land and stood in the shelter of walls and woods.
Thomas considered with himself. He was in a state as perturbed as it was possible for such a stolid spirit to be; but he remembered that the innocent cause of this revolution was now returning heavy laden up the long hill from the market town.
He decided that he would go and meet Susan. His upheaval took the form of increased solicitude for Miss Stockman.
"She shall hear the fatal news from me—not him," he reflected.
He set off and presently sighted the woman tramping up the hill in the rain. Under the wild weather and fading light, she looked like some large, bedraggled moth blown roughly about. Her basket was full and her left arm held a parcel in blue paper. It was the only spot of colour she offered. They met, greatly to her surprise.
"Good Lord!" she said. "Have father put more chores on you? Be you going to Ashburton?"
"I am not," he answered. "I came out with my big umbrella to meet you."
She was fluttered.
"How terrible kind! But 'tis no odds. I be bone-wet."
Nevertheless, Mr. Palk unfurled a large, faded, glass-green umbrella over her.
"Give me the basket," he said, "and I'll walk betwixt you and the weather. I come for more reasons than one, Susan. Something's happened while you were to town and I'd sooner you heard it from me than him."
"Nought gone wrong with father?"
"That's for others to say. But something have gone parlous wrong with me."
She started and hugged her blue paper parcel closer. It contained the bottle of brown sherry.
"I hope not, I'm sure."
"In a word, I'm sorry to say I leave Falcon Farm Monday month. It have fallen with a terrible rush upon me—and my own fault too. I can't tell you the reason, but so it is. The master's sacked me; and every right to do so, no doubt, in his own eyes."
Miss Stockman stood still and panted. Her face was wet with rain; her hair touzled; her hat dripping.
"Be you saying truth?" she asked, and fetched a handkerchief from her pocket and dried her face.
"Gospel. I done a thing as he took in a very unkind spirit I'm sorry to say."
The blue parcel trembled.
"Going—you? Never!"
"Monday month it have got to be."
"Why for? What have you gone and done? It must have been something properly fearful, for he thought the world of you, behind your back."
"To my face, however, he did not—not this evening. And as to what I done, I hope he won't feel called to name it in your ear. It was a very dangerous task, as I reckoned when I started on it; but I felt drove—Lord knows why! I meant well, but that don't amount to much when you fail. No doubt he'll get somebody he likes better; and he won't withhold a good character neither."
"This be a cruel come-along-of-it," she said blankly. "I couldn't have heard nothing to trouble me more, Thomas. You was the bestest we've ever had to Falcon Farm—and kindness alive."
"Thank you I'm sure. We've been very good friends. And why not?"
"I can't picture you gone. 'Twas a rit of temper. I'll speak to father."
"Don't you do that. There weren't no temper, nor yet language. He meant it and he's an unchanging man."
"Whatever did he say? What did you do? I will know! It shan't be hid. Perhaps 'tis only his tubes fretting him."
"No—nothing to do with his tubes. He was well within his rights. Not that I'll allow he was right, however."
"Why can't you tell me what it is then? If you want to stop—but perhaps you don't?"
He considered.
"I never thought to go, and I never wanted to go less than what I do at this minute, seeing you cast down. I be very much obliged to you in a manner of speaking for not wanting me to go."
She looked up drearily at him and sniffed.
"We never know our luck," she said. "Not you, but me."
To his intense amazement he perceived that Susan was shedding tears. She shook her head impatiently and it was not rain that fell from her face. If a small fire can kindle a great one, so surely may a drop of water swell into a river.
Light began to dawn in the mind of the man and it much astonished him by what it revealed there. He was, in fact, so astounded by the spectacle that he fell into silence and stared with mental eyes at the explanation of the mysteries that had long puzzled him. His next remark linked past with present.
"Be damned if I don't begin to know now why for I done this!" he said with a startled voice. "I've wondered for weeks and weeks what was driving me on, and I couldn't put no name to it, Susan; but 'tis coming out in me. Shut your mouth a minute and let me think."
She kept silence and they plodded on. At the top of the hill a gust caught the umbrella and it was in peril. Thomas turned it against the wind.
"Come under the lew side of the hedge," he said. "I thought 'twas conscience driving at me—but I begin to see it weren't. There's a wonder happening. Fetch in here under the trees a minute."
She followed him through a gap at the summit of the hill and they left the road for the partial shelter of spruce firs. They escaped the wind, but the rain beat from the branches upon Mr. Palk's umbrella.
"You're a woman of very high qualities and a good bit undervalued in your home—so it seems to me. You're the light of the house, but 'twas left for others to find that out seemingly—not your father. He's a man with a soft tongue, but a darned hard heart—to say it respectful."
"I'm naught and less than naught. But I was always pleased to pleasure you," she answered.
"The light of the house," he repeated. "And 'tis the light be far more to the purpose than the candlestick. I can speak to you straight, Susan, because I'm ugly as sin myself and not ashamed of it. I didn't have the choosing of my face, and my Maker didn't ax me what I'd like to look like come I grew up. And same with you. But you be a living lesson to us other plain people, and show us that the inside may be so fine no thinking man would waste a thought on the outside."
Susan was not concerned with his philosophy: she had fastened on a question of fact.
"You're not particular ugly, Thomas. I've seen scores plainer. You've got a very honest face and nice grey eyes if I may say so."
"Certainly you may say so, and I'm very well content as you've been to the trouble to mark the colour of my eyes. 'Tis a way women have. They always know the colour of their friends' eyes. And if my face be honest in your opinion, that's good news also. And as for your eyes, if they was in a prettier setting, they'd well become it."
Susan grew a dusky red, but kept to the point.
"If you can say such things as that, surely you can tell me why you're going?"
"I meddled—I—but leave the subject. 'Tis all dust and ashes afore what's stirring in my head now—now I know why I meddled. You'd like me to bide at Falcon Farm seemingly?"
"I should then. You've got nice ways, and—and you've always been amazing pitiful to me."
"Where would your father be if you left him?"
"I'll never leave him. He knows that."
"How old might you be?"
"Thirty-five—thirty-six come October."
"Some say port-wine marks are handed down, and again some say they are not. And if you was to hand it down, you'd hand down what's better too, I shouldn't wonder."
She did not answer, but gasped and stared in front of her.
"Look here," he said. "Now I see so plain why for I done this, why the mischief shouldn't you? 'Twas done because I've risen up into loving you, Susan! I want you—I want to marry you—I'll take my dying oath I do. It have just come over me like a flap of lightning. Oh, hell!"
The bottle of wine had trembled dangerously in Soosie-Toosie's arm before; now it dropped, broke on a stone, and spread its contents at their feet. The sweet air suddenly reeked of it. But Susan ignored the catastrophe.
"Me! Me! My God, you must be mad!"
"If so, then there's a lot to be said for being mad. But I ain't. I see the light. I've been after you a deuce of a time and never grasped hold of it. I didn't think to marry. In fact my mother was the only woman I ever cared a cuss about till I seed you. And no doubt, for your part you've long despaired of the males; but you'm a born wife, Susan; and you might find me a very useful pattern of husband. I love you something tremenjous, and I should be properly pleased if you could feel the same."
"'Tis beyond dreaming," she said regarding him with wild eyes. "'Tis beyond belief, Thomas."
"It may be," he admitted, "but not beyond truth. We can make it a cast-iron fact; and 'tis no odds who believes it, so long as it happens."
"You be above yourself for the minute. Your face is all alight. Best to think it over and go to church and let a Sunday pass. I can't believe you really and truly mean it."
"God's truth I do then."
"Father—did I ought to put love of you afore love of him, Thomas?"
"Certainly you did ought, and you've got the Bible behind you. If you love me, then you did ought to put me afore every damn thing, and cleave to me for ever after. Say you'll do it, like a dear woman. I want to hear you say it, Susan. 'Twill cheer me up a lot, because I've never had the sack afore in my life and don't like the taste of it. I be feeling low, and 'twill be a great thing to get back on farmer afore I go to bed to-night."
She was suspicious at once.
"You ban't doing this out of revenge, however?" she asked.
"For naught but love—that I'll swear."
"To be loved by a fine man—a go-by-the-ground creature like me!"
"And never no female better fit for it."
"I'll take you, Thomas; but if you change your mind after you've slept on it, I shan't think no worse of you. Only this I'll say, I do love you, and I have loved you a longful time, but paid no attention to it, not understanding."
"Then praise the Lord for all His blessings, I'm sure."
He held her close in his arms and they kissed each other. She clung to him fervently.
"Now, if you'll take the basket, I'll go back and buy another bottle of sherry wine," she said.
"Not at all. But we mustn't shatter the man at one blow. He'll want more than pretty drinking when he hears about this. I'll traapse down for another bottle, and you go home under my umbrella; and change every stitch on you, and drink something hot, else you might fall ill."
"Ah! That's love! That's love!" she said, looking up at him wet-eyed.
"No—only sense. I'll show 'e what love be so soon as I know myself. You get home, and say as you dropped your bottle and was just going back for another when I met you, on my way to Ashburton, and offered to get it. And on the whole us'll keep the fearful news for a few days till he's well again. 'Twill be more merciful."
"You'm made of wisdom, Tom. 'Tis a great relief to keep it from father a bit till I've got used to the thought."
"Kiss me again then," he answered, and put his arms round her once more.
"There's a brave lot of 'e to cuddle whether or no."
"'Tis all yours I'm sure, if you really want it, dear Thomas."
"I be coming to want it so fast as I can, woman!"
For Dinah Waycott the sole difficulty of her position began to clear itself; and since she was now convinced that she and Lawrence saw the future with the same vision, she felt that future approach quickly. It seemed, however, that for her, pure joy could only be reached through sorrow, and on an occasion of meeting Maynard upon the moor, she said so.
"Nothing ever do run quite smooth, and out of my misfortune my fortune comes. For it's only a terrible sad thing that be clearing the road for us and leaving nobody in my life to think of but you."
She had assumed somewhat more than her lover at this point, and in a sense, taken the lead.
"Your foster-father?" he said.
"Yes; it's a pretty dark cloud against my happiness, and if it was only for that, I'd be glad to be gone. You can't say yet he don't know me; but you can say he very soon won't. We seem to slip away from him according as he cared for us. He don't know Jane no more at all, and asks her what he can do for her when she comes in the room. But he knows Johnny off and on, and he knows me off and on too. His wife he still knows, and I can see it's life and death to her that he shall go on knowing her; because it will be a great triumph for her if, when he's forgot everybody, he still remembers her."
"I dare say it would be."
"I'd have been jealous as fire that he shouldn't forget me, if it hadn't been for you. But not now. I won't be sorry to leave him now, and just love to remember what he was to me. To think I could ever say that! It's cruel sad, poor old dear."
"There's a bright side, however," he answered. "And though you might say no man could be worse off than to lose his wits, yet for poor old Ben there's one good thing: he'll never know you've gone, or how you've gone."
"I've thought of that; but how can you be sure, if he'd had the mind left to understand, he wouldn't have been glad for me? He liked you."
"You know different, Dinah. He liked me; but he'd never have been glad, given the facts."
She was silent and Lawrence spoke again.
"He's only a shadow of a man now and will grow more and more faint, till he fades away. But you'll have the grateful memory of him."
"Yes; and if ever we get a son, Lawrence, he must be called Benjamin—I will have it so."
He fell silent. Dinah often spoke with delight of children; and it was at those times the man felt the drag on his heart hardest. They had argued much, but her frank puzzlement and even amusement at his problems and doubts began to wear them down. She knew it, but, behind her assumption of certainty, still suspected him a little. He varied and seemed more inclined to listen than to talk. But things were rushing to a conclusion and there could only be one.
It was agreed that they must now hide their friendship and their purpose for the sake of other people. Dinah grew full of plans, and Lawrence listened while she ran on; but she knew that the real plans would be made by him. A sort of vagueness came into their relation and its cause was in his head, not his heart. That, too, she knew. But certain things to-day he told her and certain things, unknown to him, she now determined to do. Impatience must have been created for Dinah this evening, but that she understood his doubts were solely on her account. She believed that nothing but questions of law remained to deter Maynard, and of their utter insignificance she had often assured him.
"I've got the facts," he said, "and I'd like for you to hear them. And, after to-night, we mustn't see each other so often. To make it easier for us when we go, we'd better keep as far apart as need be till then. There's a lot must pass between us and we can't post letters very well—not in the pillar-boxes; but we may want a pillar-box of our own presently."
"What I hate about life," she cried, "is that you've got to pretend such a lot. If this had happened to Jane, she'd love the hiding up and the plotting and turning and twisting, like a hare running away from the hounds. But I hate it. I hate to think the world's full of people, who look at life in such a way that what we're going to do must be wrong."
"They've been brought up with fixed ideas about marriage and think it's got more to do with God than with men and women. The interests of the Church are put high above right and justice for the people. They always were; and them that claim marriage is God's plan, also claim that He would chain wretched, mistaken creatures together for life, quite regardless of their honour and decency and self-respect. It's funny that educated men should write the stuff I read; but the moment you see the word 'God' in a newspaper, you can say good-bye to reason and pity. We're punished—we who make a mistake—for what? Oft for nothing but misreading character, or because truth's withheld from us on purpose. Palk was telling of a man he knew who went courting and was never told his intended's mother was in a mad-house. And he married, and his wife went out of her mind with her first child. Now she's got to be put away and may live for fifty years, and sane, well-meaning people tell the man he must bide a widower for ever-more—at the will of God! God wills he should go alone to his dying day, because his wife's people hid the truth from him."
"But the law—surely the law——?"
"The law's with the Church so far. They hunt in couples. But the law's like to be altered 'tis thought; though no doubt the Church will call down fire from Heaven if any human mercy and common sense and decency is brought to bear on marriage."
"Can't the religious people see that lots quite as good as them, and quite as willing and wishful to do right are being put in the wrong? And can't they see tortured men and women won't be patient for ever?"
"No; they put us in the wrong and they keep us in the wrong, for God's sake—so He shan't be vexed. They don't understand it isn't only adultery that breaks up marriage, but a thousand other things beside. It's human progress and education and understanding; and these pious people only leave one door to escape through. And they don't seem to see that to decent thinking and self-respecting men and women that's a door they won't enter. They say, 'If you want to right your mistake, you must sin.' But if Almighty God made marriage, He never made such filth to be thrust down the throats of them that fail in marriage. Thus, any way, it stands with Minnie Courtier at present—and with me. This is the law and clear enough. A man disappears and blots himself out of life, you may say, and, what's more important, blots himself out of the lives of everybody who knew him, including his wife. And the question is, what can the wife do about it? I've looked into this very close, and I find the issue is like a lot of other things in the law. It often depends on the judge, and how he reads the facts of the case, and whether he's all for the letter of the law, or one of the larger-minded sort, who give the spirit a chance. A man not heard about for seven years may be counted dead in the eyes of the law; but there's no presumption he died at any particular time in the seven years, and it isn't enough to say, 'Seven years are past and I'm in the right to presume somebody dead.' You must have legal permission, and judges differ. You've got to prove that diligent inquiries were made to find the vanished person before you apply to the Court, and a human sort of judge is satisfied as a rule and doesn't torment the public and sets a man or woman free. But if circumstances show that the vanished party wouldn't be heard of, even if he was alive, then many frost-bound judges won't allow he's dead, or grant freedom to a deserted partner even after seven years. So, now, though the seven years are up, even if application was made to assume my death, it rests on the character of the judge whether Mrs. Courtier would be allowed to do so."
"She may not care a button about it one way or the other," said Dinah—"any more than I do."
"Very likely. It's only of late that I've spared a thought to her. There's very little doubt in my mind that she's settled down to being a widow—had enough of men I reckon."
"You don't know, however?"
"I don't know—and it's time I did, I suppose. But how?"
Dinah considered.
"She's a clever woman and she may find herself very well content to keep herself to herself as you say. Or she may not. One thing's sure; she'll never forgive you, and she wouldn't do nothing to help you if she could."
"She can't help, any more than she can hinder."
"'Tis a great thought—that woman. I'd give a lot to know a bit about her," said Dinah. "Suppose, for example——"
Then she broke off, for her mind had suddenly opened a path which must be followed alone, if followed at all. A possibility had occurred to Dinah—a possibility of vague and shadowy outline, but still not quite devoid of substance. She wondered intensely about a certain thing, and since, when she wondered, her spirit never rested until some answer to her wonderment was forthcoming, she felt now that this problem must be approached. Indeed it was no sooner created than it possessed her, to the destruction of every lesser idea. She was on the verge of uttering it to Lawrence, but controlled herself. He might disagree, and she could brook no disagreement, even from him, before this sudden impulse. There was hope in it for them both. She acknowledged to herself that the hope must be small; but it existed.
She changed the subject with suspicious abruptness, but Maynard, following his own thoughts, which led in a different direction, did not observe that after her hiatus and a silence following on it, Dinah resumed about something else. He had also left the facts and drifted to the future. The suggestion that he himself had raised: to attempt some inquiry concerning his wife, though obvious enough to any third person, did not impress itself upon him as important. He mentioned it and dismissed it. He felt sufficiently certain of her and her present state. The details of his own future presented more attractive and pressing problems. For he was now affirmed to go—either with Dinah, or before her, on an understanding that she would follow. For the present they must certainly part and be associated no more—either by rumour or in reality.
Upon these thoughts she struck, so naturally that it seemed they were unconsciously communicating in their minds.
"We must set up a post office, Lawrence, where the letters won't need stamps; and for the minute I'd be glad if you could give me a few shillings for pocket-money. I've got a hatred now of Bamsey money and the five shillings a week Mrs. Bamsey gives me, because foster-father's past doing it himself. And I've told them that I'm not going to take any of his money in the future. I've told them very clear about that and I mean it."
"I'm glad you have. But they won't agree."
"So they say; but I shall be far ways off, beyond their reach or knowledge, long before then. And Jane knows clearly I won't touch it."
Maynard brought out a little leathern purse and gave Dinah the contents—some thirty shillings.
She thanked him and assured him that would be enough. They parted soon afterwards and arranged to meet once more, on a date a fortnight hence, in late evening, at a certain gate not above a mile from Green Hayes.
"I may have something to tell you by then," she said, "and I'll find a post office. It'll be a year till I see you again."
He took a lingering leave of her and was moved by a last word she spoke at parting.
"We never get no time to love each other," she said, "'tis all hard, hateful talk and plotting. But we'll make up to each other some day."
Then he went his way, leaving her to develop her secret determination.
Conscience smote Dinah that she should enter upon any such adventure without telling him; but the fear that he might forbid her was too great, for she felt very positive the step she designed must be to the good. Certain precious and definite knowledge at least would follow; and the worst that could happen would only leave them where they were.
She meant to go to Barnstaple. When she had broken off her speech, she was about to put it to Maynard whether the woman there might not be in his own position—desirous to marry and perhaps even already seeking the aid of the law to free herself from a vanished spouse. It seemed intensely possible to Dinah; but evidently in the mind of Lawrence no such likelihood existed. That he should not have followed the thought showed how little importance he attached to it—so little that she felt sure he would not have supported her sudden desire to learn more. Therefore she kept the inspiration from him and determined he should know nothing until her quest was accomplished.
And, he, having left her, now endeavoured, as he had endeavoured for many days, to shake his mind clear of cobwebs and traditions and prevenient fears. Even his thoughts for her seemed petty when he was with her. Deeply he longed for Dinah, and the peace that she must bring to his mind, and the contentment inevitable out of a life shared with hers.
Perhaps for the first time he now resolutely banished every doubt, thrust them behind him, and devoted all future thought to their departure from England. He inclined to Australia now from all that he had read and heard about it. There he would take Dinah, and there, as "Lawrence Maynard," he would marry her.
He began to look back upon his doubts as unmanly and mawkish; he began to marvel that, for so many painful months, he had entertained them. He assured himself that the air was clean and cloudless at last, and designed to advance the situation by definite preliminary steps before he met Dinah again.
Melinda Honeysett came to see Mr. Stockman, and it happened that she paid her visit but half an hour after heavy tidings had fallen on his ears.
From the moment of her arrival, she was aware of something unusual in his manner, and presently she learned from him all particulars.
He was in his garden, sitting alone under a little arbour constructed at the side of the house with its eye in the sun; and there he sat with his hands in his pockets, idle, staring before him. Even the customary pipe was absent from his mouth. He was restored to health, as Melinda knew; but she felt at a loss to see him dawdling thus at noon. He looked old and dejected too, nor did he rise to greet her when she entered the garden.
She approached him therefore, and he gazed indifferently and dull-eyed upon her.
"Morning, Joe. They cabbages you gave me be all bolting* I'm sorry to say, and Mr. Ford, my next door neighbour, tells me I can't do nothing."
* "Bolting"—running to seed.
"Ban't the only things that's bolting. Funny as you should be the one to face me after what I've just heard."
"You'm down seemingly?"
"Down and out you might say without straining the truth. It's a blasted world, though the sun do be happening to shine. I've had the hardest blow of my life this morning. I'm still wondering if I ban't in an evil dream."
"Terrible sorry I'm sure. Good and bad luck don't wait for the weather. I be in trouble, too—more or less. Jerry and Jane Bamsey have fallen out and I'm in two minds—sorry for Jerry, and yet not all sorry, for father always said she wasn't any good. Yet I don't know what Jerry will do if it don't come right."
Mr. Stockman seemed totally uninterested at this news. He still looked before him and brooded. Melinda took a cane chair, which stood near his, and mopped her face, for she was hot.
"Only a lovers' quarrel I dare say; but if it was broke off altogether I reckon my brother might live to be thankful. And Orphan Dinah's gone to find work somewhere. I hope she will this time. Jane thinks she's run away to get married."
"Marriage—marriage!" he said. "Perdition take all this bleating about marriage! I'm sick to death of it, as well I may be."
She was astonished.
"I never heard you talk against it for them so inclined. Marriage is a good bit in the air this summer I believe. My sailor brother, Robert, be coming home for a spell pretty soon. And he writes me as he'll wed afore he goes back to sea, if he can find one. And I thought of Dinah. And Mr. Ford, the gardener, next to me—I reckon he means to marry again. He's got a great opinion of the state. Harry Ford's my own age to a day, strange to say. Our birthdays fall together. He had no luck with his wife, but he's going to try again I can see."
"I don't want to hear no more about him, or anybody else," said Mr. Stockman. "'Tis doubtful manners mentioning him to me. If you knew what I know, you'd be dumb with horror."
"Well, I can't be horrified if you won't tell me why I should. Where's Soosie-Toosie?"
She received a shattering answer.
"To hell with Soosie-Toosie!" cried Joe.
"Man alive, what's got into you? Be you ill again, or is it Palk leaving? If that's the trouble, lift your finger and he'll stay. You do that. I lay he meant nothing but good, standing up for Susan. He's a clumsy, ignorant creature; but you're always quick to forgive faults a man can't help. Pardon the chap and let him bide. I've always told you it was going too far to sack him on that. Don't be craking about it no more. It's your fault, after all, that he's going."
He glowered at her.
"You're like cats—the pack of you—never do what a reasonable creature wants, or expects. Put a bowl for 'em and they'll only drink out of a jug. Call 'em to the fire, they'll go to the window. Ope the window for 'em and they'll turn round and make you ope the door. And only a born fool wastes time or thought to please a cat; and be damned if ever I will again."
"Be you talking about Susan, or me?" asked Mrs. Honeysett, with rising colour. She did not know what was disturbing Joe's mind and began to feel angry. He pursued his own dark thoughts a moment longer and then, as she rose to leave him, he broke his news.
"Not an hour ago, when all was peace and I had been able to tell the household I found myself well again, and was turning over an advertisement for a new horseman, they crept before me, hand in hand—like a brace of children."
"Who did?"
"Why, Susan and that blasted sarpent, Palk."
"Palk a sarpent!"
"Do, for God's sake, shut up and listen, and don't keep interrupting. They came afore me. And Palk said that, owing to a wonderful bit of news, he hoped we was going to part friends and not enemies, though he was afraid as he might have to give me another jar. Then I told him to drop my darter's hand that instant moment and not come mountybanking about when he ought to be at work; and then he said that Susan had taken him, and they hoped afore long to be married!"
"Mercy on us, Joe!"
"That's what I heard this morning. And the woman put in her oar when I asked Palk if he was drunk. She said she loved him well and dearly, and hoped that I wouldn't fling no cold water over her great joy, or be any the less a kind father to her. Got it all by heart of course."
"What a world! That's the last thing ever I should have thought to fall out."
"Or any other sane human. It's a wicked outrage in my opinion and done, of course, for revenge, because I cast the man away—cunning devil!"
"Don't you say that. You must take a higher line, Joe. Soosie-Toosie's a good woman, and you always said Thomas was a good man."
"He's not a good man. He's a beast of a man—underhand and sly and scheming. He's got one of them hateful, cast-iron memories, and when I began to talk to them and soon had my daughter dumb, it was Palk, if you please, opened his mouth and withstood me and flung my own words in my face."
"What words?"
"And it shows kind speech to that fashion of man be no better than cheese-cakes to a pig. I told him to think twice before he made himself a laughing-stock to the parish, and then he minded me of the past and a thing spoke when I sacked him, a fortnight ago. I've gone so weak as a mouse over this job I can tell you."
"Take your time. What had you said to him?"
"I'd told him, when he dared to come afore me about my way with my only child, that if there was anything in the world I could do for Susan to make her home a happier place, he might rest assured she would tell me so herself. And the sarpent remembered that and then invited the woman to speak; which she did do, and told me that her life, without this grey-headed son of a gun, wouldn't be worth living no more; and she hoped that I wouldn't pay back all her love and life-long service—'service,' mind you—by making a rumpus about it, or doing or saying anything unkind. And I've got to go down the wind like a dead leaf afore them, because I soon saw that under her mild words, Susan weren't going to be shook."
"She wouldn't be. There's no strength like the strength of a woman who gets her only chance. She knows, poor dear, 'tis Palk or nothing."
"I told 'em to get out of my sight for a pair of cold-blooded, foxy devils—yes, in my anger I said that—and so they have; and soon, no doubt, they'll be gone for good and all. And that's the middle and both ends of it; and the worst and wickedest day's work ever I heard tell about."
"You've dropped below your usual high standards, if I may say so," answered Melinda. "Little blame to you that you should feel vexed, I'm sure; but 'tis more the shock than the reality I believe. I feel the shock likewise, though outside the parties and only a friend to all. 'Tis so unlike anything as you might have expected, that it throws you off your balance. Yet, when you come to turn it over, Joe, you can't help seeing there's rhyme and reason in it."
"You say that! For a woman to fly from the safety and security of her father's home—and such a father—to a man who don't even know what work he's going to do when he leaves me. And a wretch that's proved as deep as the sea. Can't you read his game? He knows that Susan be my only one, and bound to have all some day—or he thinks he knows it. That's at the bottom of this. He looks on and says to himself, 'All will be hers; then all will be mine.'"
"Don't you say that. Keep a fair balance. Remember you held a very high opinion of Palk not two months agone, when he showed by his acts to his dead sister's child that he was a high-minded man."
"I'll thank you to keep my side of this, please," he answered. "I don't much like the line you're taking, Melinda. Just ax yourself this: would any man, young or old, look at Susan as a possible help-mate and think to marry her, if he warn't counting on the jam that would go with the powder? She's my child, and I'm not one to bemoan my fortune as to that, but a woman's a woman, and was the male ever born who could look at Susan as a woman? You know very well there never was."
"You couldn't; but men ain't all so nice as you about looks. And you can't deny that apart from being a bit homely, Susan——"
"Stop!" he said. "I believe you knew about this all the time and be here as a messenger of peace! And if I thought that——"
"Don't think nothing of the sort, there's a good man. I'd so soon have expected the sun to go backward as hear any such thing. But 'tis done on your own showing, and you must be so wise as usual about it and not let the natural astonishment upset your character. It's got to be, seemingly. So start from there and see how life looks."
Melinda indeed was also thinking how life looked. Her mind ran on and she had already reached a point to which Mr. Stockman's bruised spirit was yet to bring him. She prepared to go away.
"I won't stop no more now. You'll have a lot to think over in your mind about the future. Thank goodness you be well again—and never looked better I'm sure. What's their plans?"
"Damn their plans—how about my plans?"
"You'll come to your plans gradual. And don't think 'tis the end of the world. You never know. When things turn inside out like this, we be often surprised to find there's a lot to be said for changes after all."
"'Tis mortal easy to be wise about other folk's troubles," he said.
Then Mrs. Honeysett departed and felt Joe's moody eyes upon her back as she went slowly and thoughtfully away. Soosie-Toosie's eyes were also upon her; but that she did not know.
Joe Stockman, like a stricken animal, hid himself from his fellow men at this season; yet it was not curious that he should conceal his tribulation from fellow men, because he knew that sympathy must be denied. To run about among the people, grumbling because his daughter had found a husband, was a course that Joe's humour told him would win no commiseration. He was much more likely to be congratulated on an unexpected piece of good luck. Even Melinda, with every kindly feeling for him, proved not able to show regret; and if she could not, none might be looked for elsewhere. But he made it evident to those chiefly involved that he little liked the match; he declined to see any redeeming features and went so far as to say that the countryside would be shocked with Susan for leaving her father under such circumstances. To his surprise he could not shake her as at first he had hoped to do. She was meek, and solicitous for his every wish as usual; she failed not to anticipate each desire of his mind; she knew, by long practice, how to read his eyes without a word; but upon this one supreme matter she showed amazing determination.
She did not speak of it; neither did Thomas, and when his master, who had failed for the moment to get a new horseman worthy of Falcon Farm, invited Palk to stop another month, he agreed to do so. But Thomas grumbled to Maynard when they were alone, and at the same time heard something from Lawrence that interested him.
They were hoeing the turnips together and the elder spoke.
"There's no common decency about the man in my opinion," he said. "Goodjer take him! He's like a sulky boy and pretends that facts ban't facts, while every day of the week shows they are. And patience is very well, but it don't make you any younger. Here I've pleased him by promising to stop another month, and when I did that, I had a right to think it would break down his temper and stop the silly rummage he talks about a thankless child and so on. You know how he goes on—chittering at me and Susan, but never to us—just letting out as if he was talking to the fire, or the warming-pan on the wall—of course for us to hear."
"He's took it very hard no doubt. Of course it's a shatterer. He didn't know his luck; and when you suddenly see your luck, for the first time just afore it's going to be taken away from you, it makes you a bit wild," explained Lawrence.
"Let him be wild with himself then, and cuss himself—not us. Look at it—I meet his convenience and go on so mild as Moses, working harder than ever, and all I get be sighs and head-shakings; and you always see his lips saying 'sarpent' to himself every time you catch his eye. It's properly ondacent, because there's duties staring the man in the face and he's trying his damnedest to wriggle out of 'em!"
"What duties?"
"Why, his daughter's wedding, I should think! Surely it's up to him, whatever he feels against it, to give the woman a fatherly send off. Not that I care a cuss, and should be the better pleased if he wasn't there glumping and glowering and letting all men see he hated the job; but Susan be made of womanly feeling, and she reckons he did ought to come to the church and give her away, all nice and suent, same as other parents do. And after that there ought to be a rally of neighbours and some pretty eating and drinking, and good wishes and an old shoe for luck when us goes off to the station man and wife. And why the hell not?"
"I dare say it will work out like that. You must allow for the shock, Tom. He'd got to rely on you and your future wife like his right and left hand; and to have the pair of you snatched away together—— He's a man with a power of looking forward and, of course, he can see, in a way you can't, what he'll feel like when you both vanish off the scene."
"You be always his side."
"No, no—not in this matter, anyway. I know very well what you feel like, and nobody wishes you joy better than me. You've got a grand wife, and I've always thought a lot of you myself as you know. But 'tis just the great good fortune that's fallen to you makes it so much the worse for him. He knows what he's losing, and you can't expect him to be pleased. He'll calm down in a week or two."
"Let the man do the same then and take another. There's a very fine woman waiting for him."
"There is; and he'll take her no doubt; but there again, he knows that you can't have anything for nothing."
"He had his daughter for nothing."
"Yes, and got used to it; but he won't have Melinda Honeysett for nothing. A daughter like Susan gives all and expects no return; a wife like Mrs. Honeysett will want a run for her money. And Joe knows mighty well it will have to be give and take in future."
"Quite right too."
"There's another thing hanging over master. It won't seem much compared with you going. But I'm off before very long myself."
"By gor! You going too!"
"In the fall I reckon."
"When he hears that, he'll throw the house out of windows!"
"Not him. I'm nobody."
"If it's all the same to you, I'd be glad if you didn't break this to Stockman till our job's a thought forwarder," said Thomas. "He can only stand a certain amount. You was more to him than me really. This will very like turn him against human nature in general, and if he gets desperate, he may disgrace himself."
"I shan't speak just yet."
"We was much hoping—Soosie and me—that he'd go bald-headed for Melinda before this—if only to hit back. Because, if he done that, he might cut my future wife out of his will you see. And, in his present spirit of mind, I believe it would comfort him a lot to do so—and tell me he had."
"No, no—he wouldn't lower himself like that. And as for Mrs. Honeysett, I reckon he's to work in that quarter. He can't strike all of a sudden, of course, because the people would say he'd only done it for his own convenience; but he'll be about her before long I expect. He's been saying in a good few places that he must marry now."
"He named her name at Green Hayes to my certain knowledge," said Thomas, "and Mrs. Bamsey heard him do so; and she told Arthur Chaffe, the carpenter; and he told his head man; and he told me. And he said more. He said that Arthur Chaffe had marked that Joe had lost a lot of his old bounce and weren't by no means so charming as he used to be."
"There's no doubt this job has upset him a lot."
"Then where's his religion? He did ought to remember he can't go sailing on and have everything his own way all his life, no more than anybody else."
They hoed together shoulder to shoulder, then reached the end of their rows and turned again.
"There's a religious side no doubt," admitted Maynard. "And we never feel more religious, if we're religious-minded at all, than after a stroke of good fortune; and never less so than after a stroke of bad. And I'm telling you what I know there, because I've been called to go into such things pretty close. There's nothing harder than to break away from what you was taught as a child. 'Tis amazing how a thing gets rooted into a young mind, and how difficult it may be for the man's sense to sweep it away come he grows up."
Mr. Palk, however, was not concerned with such questions.
"I don't want to break away from nothing," he said. "I only want for Stockman to treat me and his daughter in a right spirit. And what I say is, if his religion and church-going, not to name his common sense, can't lead him right, it's a very poor advertisement for his boasted wisdom."
"So it would be; but he'll come round and do right, only give him time," answered Lawrence.
"And what's in your mind?" asked Thomas presently, as he stood up to rest his back. "Have you got another billet in sight?"
"No. I much want to get abroad. It's always been a wish with me to see a foreign country."
"A very fine idea. I'd so soon do the same as not; but I heard a chap say that you find the land pretty near all under machinery if you go foreign. And I shouldn't care to quit hosses at my time of life."
"There's your wife to think on. She'd never like to put the sea between her and her father."
"As to that," answered Palk, "it's going to be largely up to him. If he carries on like what he's doing now, he'll have to pay for it; because the woman's only a human woman and she haven't deserved this conduct. Why, God's light! if she'd stole his money-box and set the house on fire he couldn't take it no worse!"
These things were heard by another pair of ears in the evening of that day, for then Maynard saw Dinah again. But much passed between the lovers before they reached the subject of Susan and Thomas. Maynard had been deeply interested to hear of Dinah's sudden departure, of which she had told him nothing, and he had puzzled ever since learning the fact mentioned by Melinda Honeysett. For he did not guess her purpose, or her destination, and the fact that she had gone away only served to explain her need for money. She let him know, however, before they met, and that without any word; for during her absence, there came a picture postcard to Lawrence—a coloured picture of Barnstaple parish church; and that told him everything.
He trusted her, but knew her forthright ways and felt very anxious to see her again. The date and place for their next meeting had been fixed between them at their last conversation, and as he had heard that Dinah was returned, he knew that she would keep the appointment. He brooded for hours upon her action and inclined to a shadow of regret that she should have taken it, yet the fact did not astonish him, looking back at their last meeting; for had Dinah asked permission to go, he would not have suffered it in his mood at the time. That she knew; and yet she had gone. He recognised the immense significance of her action and the time seemed interminable until the dusk of that day, when he was free. The night came mild and grey with a soft mist. Their meeting place was a gate in a lane one mile from Green Hayes among the woods ascending to Buckland. There it had been planned they should join each other for the last time before one, or both, disappeared from the Vale.
Maynard felt a curious sense of smallness as he went to the tryst. He seemed to be going to meet somebody stronger, more resolute, more steadfast of spirit than himself. Surely Dinah had done the things that would have better become him to do. And yet he could not blame himself there, for it would have been impossible for him to set foot in the town where, no doubt, his wife still lived. He had wearied himself with futile questions, impossible to answer until Dinah should meet him, and there was nothing left but intense love and worship for her in Maynard's mind when they did meet. If she had any sort of good news, so much the better; but if she had none, he yet had good news for her. He had banished the last doubt during her absence and now told himself that not moral sensibility, but moral cowardice had ever caused him to doubt. He had probed the equivocal thing in him and believed that its causes were deep down in some worthless instinct, independent of reason. She should at least find him as clear and determined as herself at last. He had decided for Australia, and the question of their separate or simultaneous disappearance was also decided. She had to hear to-night that they could not leave England together for her credit's sake. The details of their actions were also defined. He had planned a course that would, he hoped, suit Dinah well enough, though as yet he knew not whether any word of hers might modify it.
She was waiting for him and came into his arms with joy. She guessed that her postcard had revealed her adventure and began by begging for forgiveness. This he granted, but bade her talk first.
"It's made me long to go out in the world," she said. "Just this taste. I've never seemed to understand there was anything beyond Ashburton and Lower Town; but now I've gone afield and seen miles and miles of England, and I've met people that never heard of the Vale. Say you ban't cross again, my dear heart. You know very well why I went. It rose up on me like a flame of fire—to make sure. I told 'em at Green Hayes I had some business up the country and they think I went to be married—Jane's idea that was. She's positive sure I'm married, though I've told her in plain words I'm not. Of course they be curious, but I couldn't tell a lie about it. So I said 'business.'"
"Never mind them. I won't swear I'd have said 'no' if you'd asked me, Dinah—not if I'd thought twice. It was a natural, needful point, and you grasped it quicker than I did, and no doubt made up your mind while I was maundering on about the law. I saw all that after I got your card. But I couldn't have gone myself."
"It was my work and I've done it; and I wish more had come of it. But nothing has. I took a room in a little inn near the station and tramped about and found her shop in the best part of the town. A big place with fine windows—a dairy and creamery and refreshment room. Just 'Courtier' over the windows, in big, gold letters, and a few maidens inside and—tea. I marked her, of course, the minute I saw her. She's in the shop herself—rather grand, but not above lending a hand when they're busy. She's up in the world. They knew about her at the inn where I stopped, and told me the story. They said her husband went mad on the honeymoon and disappeared off the earth. I went to the shop three times and had my tea there, and the second time there was a man at the counter talking to her. But he didn't look much of it. So there it is. She's going on with her life just as you thought, and making money; and what the people see, I saw, and what they don't see, or know, is no matter. But she was quite pleased with herself—a cheerful woman to the eye. You can tell that much.
"She's worn well I should think. She's a pretty woman; but she's hard and her voice is hard. She wouldn't have no mercy on people under her. She drove her maidens in the shop and was down on 'em if they talked much to customers. At my inn she was spoke very well of and thought a bit of a wonder. You was forgot. They said it was thought you killed yourself. And now that the seven years are up, some fancied she might marry again, but others didn't think she ever would, being too independent. A man or two they mentioned; but the opinion I heard most was that she never wanted to change. I couldn't ax too much about her, of course."
So Dinah told her tale.
"I wish it had been different," she went on. "I hoped all sorts of things—that I'd find her married again, or gone, or, perhaps dead. But there she is, so large as life, and I shouldn't think she'd ever marry for love, but she might for money, or for getting a bit more power. I didn't feel to hate her in the least, or anything like that. I felt sorry for her in a way, knowing what she'd missed, and I thought, if it had been different, what a big man you might be by now. But you'll be bigger some day along with me. And so we know where we are, Lawrence."
He asked various questions, which she answered, and he observed how absolutely indifferent Dinah found herself before the facts. She evidently recognised no relationship whatever between the husband and wife. From the adventures at Barnstaple she returned to the present, and he let her talk on, waiting to speak himself till she had finished.
She had been away nine days and returned to find Jane fallen out with Jerry Withycombe. Mr. Bamsey had recognised her on her return and called her by name and made her sit beside him for a long time. But the next morning he had forgotten her again. Faith Bamsey had also thought Dinah must have disappeared to be married, but believed her when she vowed it was not so. John Bamsey was away for the time, doing bailiff's work up the river above Dartmeet.
Then he told her of his determination and greatly rejoiced her, save in one particular.
"We don't go together," he said, "and the details will very soon clear themselves; but there must be no shadow on your memory, here or anywhere, when you're gone. I give Joe notice presently and go to Australia, to get the home ready. You find work and, for a bit, keep that work. Then you leave it for London, or a big town, where ships sail from, and your passage is took and you come along. That leaves them guessing here, and none can ever say a word against you. But so sure as we go together, then Stockman tells everybody that I'm a married man, and the harm's done."
"You do puzzle me!" she answered. "You can't get this bee out of your bonnet, Lawrence—such a clever chap as you, too. What in fortune's name does it matter what Cousin Joe says about you, or what the people believe about me? I know you're not married, and when I wed you I shall be your one and lawful wife. Who else is there—now foster-father be gone? That was the only creature on earth I could hurt, and he's past hurting, poor old dear. I like your plan all through but there. I'm going when you go, and half the joy of my life would be lost if I didn't sail along with you in the ship. That I do bargain for. Oh, I wish it was to-morrow we were running away!"
"I hate to run."
"I love it—yes, I do, now. I wish to God I wasn't going to lose sight of you again. But it won't be for long."
They spoke of the details and he pointed out that her plan must increase the difficulties somewhat, yet she would take no denial.
"What's all this fuss for? False pride," she said. "You've got to think for me the way I want you to think, not the way you want to think. If we know we're right, why should we fret if all the rest of the world thought different? I'm hungry and thirsty to go and be in a new world with you. I want you and I want a new world. And you will be my new world for that matter."
"I know that."
"Together then. 'Twould spoil all any other way. 'Twould be small any other way. 'Twould be cringing to the Vale."
He laughed.
"I can't keep you here in the rain all night. The next thing is our post office—from now on."
"Promise about my going with you."
"That means thinking over all the plans again."
"Think them over again then; and I'll help. And I've found the post office. List!"
They kept silence for half a minute, but Dinah had only heard a night-bird.
"'Tis here!" she said, "twenty yards down the lane. I found it in the spring—a wrennys' nest hid under the ivy on the bank. No better place. 'Tis empty now and snug as need be."
He accompanied her to the spot, lit matches and examined the proposed post office. It was safe enough, for the snug, domed nest lay completely hidden under a shower of ivy, and Dinah had only discovered it by seeing the little birds pop in when they were building.
Lawrence doubted; it seemed a frail receptacle for vital news; but it was dry and as safe as possible.
"I'd thought to put a tobacco tin under a stone somewhere," he said, "but perhaps this couldn't be beat."
He took careful note of it and marked the exact spot as well as he could in the dark. A sapling grew in the hedge opposite and he took his knife and blazed the bark behind, where only he, or Dinah, would find the cut.
"There'll be a letter for you in a few days," she said, "for I know I've forgot a thousand things; and when your new plans be finished, you'll write 'em for me."
"We must go slow and steady," he answered. "I've got to give Joe warning presently, and I don't mean to be out of work longer than I can help. When we know what we're going to do to the day, then I'll speak; and he won't like it none too well. He's terrible under the weather about Susan."
He told her the Falcon Farm news, with details which she had not heard.
"I'm sorry for Cousin Joe, but mighty glad for Susan, and I'm coming up one day to supper to congratulate her—why not?"
"It will be something just to look at you across the table," he said, "but we'd best speak little to each other."
Dinah grew listless as the moment for leave-taking came. Her mood was shadowed.
"I know it's right and wise to keep apart now," she told him. "And I know we can never have none of the old faces round us when we're married, and none of the little pleasures that go with old friends. But I am sorry. It's small, but I am sorry."
"So am I, for your sake," he answered. "And it's not small. It's natural. This is the only home you know, and the only folks you know are in it. And most are kindly and good. It only looks small against the bigger thing of being together for evermore. The time won't be long. 'Twill slip away quicker than you'll like I guess. And there's plenty of new friends waiting for us down under."
"It's cruel of life," she cried. "It's hard and cruel of life to make love like ours so difficult. Open air, daylight creatures, like us, to be called to plot and scheme and hide against the frozen silliness of the world. Just the things I hate most. And now we must trust the house a little bird have made with things that we'd both be proud to shout from the church steeple!"
"I know every bit what you're feeling. I feel it too—I hate it more than you do—knowing what you are. It will soon be over."
"I'll come up and look at you anyhow," said Dinah. "That won't shock the people; and I dare say, now that Susan knows what it is to love a man—but don't you fear. I won't kiss you even with my eyes, Lawrence."
"Susan wouldn't see nothing for that matter," he said. "Love be a dour pastime for her and Palk as things are. They be like us in a way—frightened to look at each other under that roof."
"But firm," she said. "Cousin Joe ain't going to choke Susan off it?"
"Not him. She'll take Thomas, so sure as you take me."
Dinah was cheerful again before he left her.
"When we'm married, I'll always be wanting to kiss you afore the people," she said, "just for the joy of doing it openly."
Then they parted, to meet no more in secret until they should never part again.
He half regretted her determination to sail with him, as he tramped home; yet he felt in no mind to argue the point. In his present spirit, sharing her indignation that his fellow men would thrust him away from Dinah for ever if they could, he cared little more than she for what their world might say and think when they had vanished from it for a larger.