"Ay, well, you've likely heard all this before," he finished lamely in the middle of a speech, conscious that he had missed his point, though without being able to say how. "We've had a bad year this year an' all, and I can't see as it's any use holding on. Me and my missis fixed it up as we come in, so if you'll take my notice, sir, we'll go next spring."

"Your wife's in town, is she?" Dent asked. For some reason he looked again at the window from which he had waved. "How does she take the thought of leaving the farm?"

"Well, sir, we'll both feel it, after all these years, but I don't know as it's any use calling out. I put it to her as we'd better quit, and she agreed to it right off."

"I wish you'd brought her along," the agent said, still speaking in a detached tone. There were some notes on the table within reach of his hand, and he glanced thoughtfully at them as he spoke.

Simon stiffened a little, and looked surprised. "I'm speaking for both on us, sir, as I said before."

"Of course, Simon," Dent said, rousing himself. "I know that. But I'd have liked a word with her, all the same." His glance went back to the notes, and he smiled as if at his own thoughts.... "And so you've really made up your minds that you'd better go?"

"Haven't I been saying so, sir, all along?" Simon was really injured now, and his wounded dignity showed in his tone. Mr. Dent was taking the whole thing far too easily, he thought. First of all, he did not seem to be listening as much as he might, and then, when the notice was offered, he actually smiled! Tenants of forty years' standing do not look to have their departure speeded with smiles. Simon thought it heartless, to say the least, and only to be excused because Mr. Dent did not know what they had to face. They had not been very satisfactory tenants, of course,--even Simon admitted that,--and it was more than likely that the agent was rather relieved. At least he was saved the unpleasant task of turning them out, a duty which, as Simon knew, had seemed imminent more than once. But they were respectable folk of good stock, and they were not entirely to blame because they were failures, too. Gravity was their due, anyhow, if not sympathy, but Mr. Dent, on this solemn occasion, seemed to be failing them in both.

"Of course you know you're late with your notice?" he observed presently, looking up. "You ought to have made up your minds a couple of months ago."

"Ay, we're late, I know, but we weren't thinking of owt o' the sort then. I'm sorry if we've put you about, but you'll not have that much trouble in getting rid of the farm. It's n.o.bbut a small spot, you'll think on. It'll let right off the reel."

"It's been going back a long while, though," Dent said thoughtfully, and then felt penitent as the old man flushed. Just for the moment he had forgotten that Simon was in the room.

"Of course I know you've had pretty rough luck," he went on hastily, trying to cover it up. "Sandholes holds the record for every sort of mischance. It sounds like one of the old fairy-tales," he added, laughing,--"curses and all that! ... But I can't help thinking it would have been better for everybody if there had been a change earlier on."

"Ay, well, you've gitten your change now, and no mistake about it!"

Simon retorted angrily, deeply hurt. There was something wrong with the scene, though he could not tell what it was. He only knew that he had not expected it to go in the very least like this.

"It should have been made long since if it was to do you any good...."

Dent did not seem to notice that there was anything amiss. He sat, tapping the table, deep in thought, while Simon seethed.... "Sure you couldn't put on for another year?"

This change of front upset his visitor so completely that he dropped his hat. He sat glaring at Mr. Dent with a dropped mouth.

"Nay, then, I just couldn't!" he snapped at last, wondering whether he was on his head or his heels. "Losh save us!" he added angrily, "haven't I tellt you I meant to gang ever since I come in? It'll take me all my time to hang on till spring, as it is."

"You've run it as close as that?" Dent enquired, and Simon gave a grunt.

"Ay, and I'm not the first as has done it, neither!"

"Couldn't your Blindbeck brother see to give you a hand? He's done well for himself, I should say, and his children are getting on."

"He's given us a hand more than once already, has Will, but there's no sense in throwing good money after bad. We'll have to quit next year, if we don't this. Farm's going back, as you say, and I'm over old to pull it round. I can't keep going for ever, nay, nor my missis, neither."

He remembered Sarah's eyes as he spoke, and how they were enough to clinch the matter in themselves, but he was too offended even to mention them by now. There was no telling to-day how Mr. Dent would take the tragic news. He had smiled and looked cheerful over the notice to quit, but Simon felt he would not be able to bear it if he smiled at Sarah's eyes. Indeed, it was all he could do to keep a hold on himself, as it was,--first of all hearing that he ought to have gone long since, and then being told to stop when he'd settled to clear out!

The trend of his injured thought must have reached the other at last, for he roused himself to look at his sulky face.

"You needn't think I'm trying to shove the place down your throat!" he said, with a laugh. "But I certainly thought you'd rather be stopping on!"

Simon felt a little appeased, though he took care not to show any sign.

He growled miserably that they had never intended to quit except under a coffin-lid.

"This is where you want a lad of your own to take hold,--a lad with a good wife who would be able to see to you both. You've no news, I suppose, of that son of yours that went overseas?"

"A word or two, now and then,--nowt more. Nowt as'd set you running across t'countryside to hear."

"No chance of getting him home again, is there?" Dent enquired, and Simon stared at the floor and shook his head. He must have felt a change in the atmosphere, however, for suddenly he began to repeat what Sarah had told May, how Geordie had written for money, and there had been none to send. The words came easily after he had made a start, and for the time being he forgot his resentment and injured-tenant's pride.

"I reckon you know, sir, how it all come about. There'll ha' been plenty o' folk ready to tell you, I'll be bound, and them as knowed least'll likely ha' tellt you most. We never had but the one lad, Sarah and me, and, by Gox! but he was a limb! The queer thing was that my brother Will's eldest should ha' been the very marrow o' mine,--looks, voice, ways, ay, and character an' all. Will and me were whyet enough lads, I'm sure; it was terble strange we should breed a pair o'

rattlehorns like yon. You couldn't rightly say there was any harm to 'em, but they were that wick they mun always be making a stir. Being that like, too, helped 'em rarely when there was chanst o' their getting catched. Each on 'em had a call for telling when he was about. Jim's was a heron like, but Geordie's was n.o.bbut a gull----"

This time it was his own glance that went to the window, as again he remembered the bird gone out to the waves. When Dent spoke, his mind came back from its flight with a tiny jerk.

"Then they made off to Canada, didn't they, the two lads? You told me something about it when I first came."

"Ay, they cleared off in a night without a word or owt, and they've never done no good from then to this. Sarah sticks to it Geordie would never ha' gone at all if it hadn't been for Jim, and Will's missis sticks to it t'other way about. I reckon there was nowt to choose between 'em myself, but my missis never could abide poor Jim. He was that set on her, though, there was no keeping him off the spot. Right cruel she was to him sometimes, but she couldn't drive him off. He'd just make off laughing and whistling, and turn up again next day. Of course, she was bound to have her knife into him, for his mother's sake.

She and Eliza have always been fit to scratch at each other all their lives."

"Long enough to finish any feud, surely, and a bit over? It's a pity they can't bury the hatchet and make friends."

"They'll happen make friends when the rabbit makes friends wi' the ferret," Simon said grimly, "and the blackbird wi' the cat! I don't say Sarah isn't to blame in some ways, but she's had a deal to put up wi', all the same. There's summat about Eliza as sets you fair bilin' inside your bones! It's like as if she'd made up her mind to pipe Sarah's eye straight from the very start. She never said ay to Will, for one thing, till Sarah and me had our wedding-day fixed, and then danged if she didn't make up her mind to get wed that day an' all! She fixed same church, same parson, same day and same time,--ay, an' there's some folk say she'd ha' fixed on t'same man if she'd gitten chanst!" He paused for a moment to chuckle when he had said that, but he was too bitter to let his vanity dwell on it for long. "She tellt parson it was a double wedding or summat o' the sort, but she never let wit on't to Sarah and me until she was fair inside door. Sarah and me walked to kirk arm in arm, wi' nowt very much by-ordinar' on our backs; but Eliza come scampering up in a carriage and pair, donned up in a white gown and wi'

a gert, waggling veil. Will was that shammed on it all he couldn't abide to look me in t'face, but there, I reckon he couldn't help hisself, poor lad! Sarah was that wild I could feel her fair dodderin'

wi' rage as we stood alongside at chancel-step. She was that mad she could hardly shape to get her tongue round Weddin'-Service or owt, and when we was in t'vestry I see her clump both her feet on the tail of Eliza's gown. She would have it n.o.body knew she was as much as getting wed at all,--they were that busy gawping at Eliza and her veil. She was a fine, strapping la.s.s, Eliza was, and I'd a deal o' work keeping my eyes off'n her myself! ... ay, and I won't say but what she give me a sheep's eye or so at the back o' Will as well...." He chuckled again, and his face became suddenly youthful, with a roguish eye. "But yon was no way o' starting in friendly, was it, Mr. Dent?

"Ay, well, things has gone on like that atween 'em more or less ever since, and I won't say but Sarah's gitten a bit of her own back when she's gitten chanst. Will having all the luck and such-like hasn't made things better, neither. Blindbeck's ganged up and Sandholes has ganged down,--ay, and seems like to hit bottom afore it stops! Will and me have hung together all along, but the women have always been at each other's throats. It riled Eliza Jim being always at our spot, and thinking a deal more o' Sarah than he did of her. Neither on 'em could break him of it, whatever they said or did. He always stuck to it Sandholes was his home by rights."

"Pity the two of them aren't here to help you now," Dent said. "Those runabout lads often make fine men."

"Nay, I doubt they've not made much out, anyway round." Simon shook his head. "Likely they're best where they be," he said, as Sarah had said on the road in. He sat silent a moment longer for politeness' sake, and then was stopped again as he rose to go.

"May I enquire what you intend to do when you leave the farm?"

The old man's face had brightened as he talked, but now the shadow came over it again.

"I can't rightly tell, sir, till I've had a word wi' Will, but anyway he'll not let us come to want. He's offered us a home at Blindbeck afore now, but I reckon his missis'd have summat to say to that. Ay, and mine an' all!" he added, with a fresh attempt at a laugh. "There'd be lile or nowt done on t'farm, I reckon, if it ever come about. It'd take the lot on us all our time to keep them two apart!"

Again, as he finished, he remembered Sarah's eyes, and once again he let the opportunity pa.s.s. He was on his feet now, anxious to get away, and there seemed little use in prolonging this evil hour. Mr. Dent would think they were for ever whingeing and whining and like enough calling out before they were hurt.... He moved hurriedly to the door, conscious of a sense of relief as well as of loss, and Sarah's eyes missed their final chance of getting into the talk....

"You're likely throng, sir," he finished, "and I'll not keep you." He put a hand to the latch. "Anyway, you'll kindly take it as we'll quit next year."

Dent said--"No, Simon, I shan't do anything of the sort!" and laughed when the other shot round on him again with open mouth. His expression was grave, however, as he ended his speech. "I want you to think it over a bit first."

Simon felt his head going round for the second time. The red came into his thin face.

"I don't rightly know what you're driving at, sir," he said, with a dignified air. "I reckon I can give in my notice same as anybody else?"

"Oh, Lord, yes, Simon! Of course." Dent's eyes went back to the notes.

"Yes, of course you can."

"Ay, well, then?" Simon demanded stiffly. "What's all this stir?"

"Well, ... it's like this, you see ... you've missed your time. It was due a couple of months back, as I said before."