LITMIR.BIZ

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glance when George at last pushed back his chair and said he supposed he’d better make a start.

      “Ay,” said the father in a mild, conciliatory tone, “I’ll be out in a minute.”

      The lamp hung against the barn wall, softly illuminating the lower part of the building, where bits of hay and white dust lay in the hollows between the bricks, where the curled chips of turnip scattered orange gleams over the earthen floor; the lofty roof, with its swallows’ nests under the tiles, was deep in shadow, and the corners were full of darkness, hiding, half hiding, the hay, the chopper, the bins. The light shone along the passages before the stalls, glistening on the moist noses of the cattle, and on the whitewash of the walls.

      George was very cheerful; but I wanted to tell him my message. When he had finished the feeding, and had at last sat down to milk, I said:

      “I told you Leslie Tempest was at our house when I came away.”

      He sat with the bucket between his knees, his hands at the cow’s udder, about to begin to milk. He looked up a question at me.

      “They are practically engaged now,” I said.

      He did not turn his eyes away, but he ceased to look at me. As one who is listening for a far-off noise, he sat with his eyes fixed. Then he bent his head, and leaned it against the side of the cow, as if he would begin to milk. But he did not. The cow looked round and stirred uneasily. He began to draw the milk, and then to milk mechanically. I watched the movement of his hands, listening to the rhythmic clang of the jets of milk on the bucket, as a relief. After a while the movement of his hands became slower, thoughtful — then stopped.

      “She has really said yes?”

      I nodded.

      “And what does your mother say?”

      “She is pleased.”

      He began to milk again. The cow stirred uneasily, shifting her legs. He looked at her angrily, and went on milking. Then, quite upset, she shifted again, and swung her tail in his face.

      “Stand still!” he shouted, striking her on the haunch. She seemed to cower like a beaten ‘woman. He swore at her, and continued to milk. She did not yield much that night; she was very restive; he took the stool from beneath him and gave her a good blow; I heard the stool knock on her prominent hipbone. After that she stood still, but her milk soon ceased to flow.

      When he stood up, he paused before he went to the next beast, and I thought he was going to talk. But just then the father came along with his bucket. He looked in the shed, and, laughing in his mature, pleasant way, said:

      “So you’re an onlooker today, Cyril — I thought you’d have milked a cow or two for me by now.”

      “Nay,” said I, “Sunday is a day of rest — and milking makes your hands ache.”

      “You only want a bit more practice,” he said, joking in his ripe fashion. “Why, George, is that all you’ve got from Julia?”

      “It is.”

      “H’m — she’s soon going dry. Julia, old lady, don’t go and turn skinny.”

      When he had gone, and the shed was still, the air seemed colder. I heard his good-humoured “Stand over, old lass,” from the other shed, and the drum-beats of the first jets of milk on the pail.

      “He has a comfortable time,” said George, looking savage. I laughed. He still waited.

      “You really expected Lettie to have him,” I said.

      “I suppose so,” he replied, “then she’d made up her mind to it. It didn’t matter — what she wanted — at the bottom.”

      “You?” said I.

      “If it hadn’t been that he was a prize — with a ticket — she’d have had —”

      “You!” said I.

      “She was afraid — look how she turned and kept away —”

      “From you?” said I.

      “I should like to squeeze her till she screamed.”

      “You should have gripped her before, and kept her,” said I. “She — she’s like a woman, like a cat — running to comforts — she strikes a bargain. Women are all tradesmen.”

      “Don’t generalise, it’s no good.”

      “She’s like a prostitute —”

      “It’s banal! I believe she loves him.”

      He started, and looked at me queerly. He looked quite childish in his doubt and perplexity.

      “She what —

      “Loves him — honestly.”

      “She’d ‘a loved me better,” he muttered, and turned to his milking. I left him and went to talk to his father. When the latter’s four beasts were finished, George’s light still shone in the other shed.

      I went and found him at the fifth, the last cow. When at length he had finished he put down his pail, and going over to poor Julia, stood scratching her back, and her poll, and her nose, looking into her big, startled eye and murmuring. She was afraid; she jerked her head, giving him a good blow on the cheek with her horn.

      “You can’t understand them,” he said sadly, rubbing his face, and looking at me with his dark, serious eyes.

      “I never knew I couldn’t understand them. I never thought about it — till —”

      “But you know, Cyril, she led me on.” I laughed at his rueful appearance.

      Chapter 8

       The Riot of Christmas

       Table of Contents

      For some weeks, during the latter part of November and the beginning of December, I was kept indoors by a cold. At last came a frost which cleared the air and dried the mud. On the second Saturday before Christmas the world was transformed; tall, silver and pearl-grey trees rose pale against a dim blue sky, like trees in some rare, pale Paradise; the whole woodland was as if petrified in marble and silver and snow; the holly-leaves and long leaves of the rhododendron were rimmed and spangled with delicate tracery.

      When the night came clear and bright, with a moon among the hoar-frost, I rebelled against confinement, and the house. No longer the mists and dank weather made the home dear; tonight even the glare of the distant little iron works was not visible, for the low clouds were gone, and pale stars blinked from beyond the moon.

      Lettie was staying with me; Leslie was in London again. She tried to remonstrate in a sisterly fashion when I said I would go out.

      “Only down to the Mill,” said I. Then she hesitated a while — said she would come too. I suppose I looked at her curiously, for she said:

      “Oh — if you would rather go alone —!”

      “Come — come — yes, come!” said I, smiling to myself.

      Lettie was in her old animated mood. She ran, leaping over rough places, laughing, talking to herself in French. We came to the Mill. Gyp did not bark. I opened the outer door and we crept softly into the great dark scullery, peeping into the kitchen through the crack of the door.

      The mother sat by the hearth, where was a big bath half full of soapy water, and at her feet, warming his bare legs at the fire, was David, who had just been bathed. The mother was gently rubbing his fine fair hair into a cloud. Mollie was combing out her brown curls, sitting by her father, who, in the fire-seat, was reading aloud in a hearty voice, with quaint precision. At the table sat Emily and George: she was quickly picking over a pile of little yellow raisins, and he, slowly, with his head sunk, was stoning the large raisins. David kept

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