It was a March twilight, cold and rustling, and tart with the scents of newly turned furrows. Reuben sat with Alice in the kitchen, and every now and then Jury's wretched house-place would shake as the young gale swept up rainless from the east and poured itself into cracks and chimneys. Alice was sewing as usualit struck Reuben that she was very quick and useful with her fingers, whatever might be her drawbacks in other ways. Sometimes she had offered to read poetry to him, and had once bored him horribly with In Memoriam, but as he had taken no trouble to hide his feelings she had to his great relief announced her intention of casting no more pearls before swine.
He also missed her in the househer soft pale face and gentle ways. He forgot the sallowness and the peevishness of later years, and pictured her always with creamy roseal skin and timid voice. He was the only one who missed her. Mrs. Backfield's softer feelings seemed to have been atrophied by hard workshe grew daily more and more like a machine; the children were too young to care much, and Harry was incapable of regret. However, the strange thing about Harry was that he did indeed seem to miss someone, but not Naomi. For the first time since little Fanny's death he began to ask for her, and search for her about the house"Where's the pretty baby?oh, save the pretty baby!" he would wail"she's gone, she's gonethe pretty baby's gone.""Sack your chaff, nowcan't you sack your chaff?"
TWO:"Git up!" cried Backfield, colouring with annoyance."The word of the Lord de Boteler," replied Calverley, "is warrant enough for the capture of the murderess of his child. Surrender, Stephen Holgrave, I command!"
THREE:"You see, this is my very best gown," she confided[Pg 155] to Robert outside the house, "and I d?an't know wot I shud do if anything happened to it."
