"Ay, but you're not that hard and fast about notice, as a rule! Tom Robison did t'same thing last year, you'll think on, and you let it pa.s.s. Seems to me you're by way of having a joke wi' me, sir," he added, in a pitiful tone, "and I don't know as it's kind, seeing how I'm placed."

Dent jumped to his feet and came across to lay a hand on his arm.

"It's only that I've a feeling you'll change your mind, Simon," he said earnestly, "and you'll be sorry if you've spread it about that you're going to quit. A week, say,--a week won't make that much difference, will it? Can't you let it stand over another week?"

"You said a minute back 'twas a pity we'd stopped so long! I can't make out what you're at, Mr. Dent,--I'm danged if I can!"

The agent laughed and left him to stroll back again to the window, where he stood looking down into the full street.

"Perhaps we're neither of us as clear in our minds as we might be!" he observed, with a cryptic smile. "The weather, perhaps; it's only a dreary day. I'm not one of the folks who like November grey."

"Tides is big an' all," Simon found himself saying, unable to resist the lure. "We've had t'watter up agen t'wall every night this week. Last night I went out for a look afore it was dark, but it was that thick it was all I could do to tell it was there at all. There was just summat grey-like lifting under my nose; but, by Gox! it was deep enough for all it was so whyet!"

Dent shivered at the drear little picture which the other had conjured up.

"I don't know how you sleep," he said, "perched on the edge of things like that! It would give me fits to have the sea knocking twice a day at my back door."

"Ay, it knocks," Simon said slowly, with a thoughtful air. "There's whiles you'd fair think it was axing for somebody to come out.... You'll mind yon time you were near catched by the tide?" he went on, after a pause. "Eh, man, but I was in a terble tew yon night!"

"It was my own fault," Dent laughed,--"not that it was any the nicer for that! I knew the time of the tide, but I'd forgotten the time of day.

It was a day something like this, much the same dismal colour all through. Lord, no!" He shivered again. "I've not forgotten, not I!

I'll never forget pounding away from that horrible wave, and finding myself, quite without knowing it, back below the farm!"

"It was my missis saved you that night," Simon said, "and a near shave it was an' all! Tide would ha' got you even then if it hadn't been for her. We heard you hollerin' and came out to look, but we couldn't see nowt, it was that dark. I thought we'd fancied it like, as we didn't hear no more, but Sarah wouldn't hear of owt o' the sort. She would have it she could see you liggin' at bottom o' t'bank, and she give me no peace till I'd crammelled down to look."

"Well, you may be sure I'm grateful enough," the agent said, as they shook hands. "I wouldn't wish my worst enemy a death like that. I hope it's been put to the credit side of her account."

He followed this caller out as he had done the last, and again, leaning over the railing, he called "Good luck!" Simon, looking up, full of resentment, saw the face above him bright with smiles. He went out with offended dignity written in every line.

PART II

ELIZA

I

It was two o'clock and after before the old folks left Witham. Simon had gone to his dinner on quitting the agent, and at his favourite eating-house he encountered others who wanted the hea.r.s.e-story at first hand. He was not at all averse to talking about it by now, and after a good dinner it improved with the telling every time. Once more he forgot the interview of the morning as well as the coming one in the afternoon, and stayed smoking and talking and sunning himself in the fine atmosphere of success.

Sarah, however, had neither pipe nor admiring circle to soothe or enliven the heavy, dragging hours. She went into the inn after the 'Ship' dog-cart had rattled off, and tried to gather a little comfort from the parlour fire; but the glamour of the morning had departed with May, and now that she was alone she felt depressed and tired. The doctor's verdict, which had pa.s.sed her by at the time, rushed back upon her, shaking her nerves and chilling her heart. She began to wonder what it would be like to be really blind, and in a sudden panic she made a strained attempt to discern the pictures and almanacks in the room, tracing the patterns of the antimaca.s.sars with a shaking finger, and the shapes of the chair-backs and table-legs. When she was really blind, Simon would have to do for her instead of her doing for him, but he would only make a poorish job of it, she felt sure. There would still be plenty for both of them to do, in spite of the fact that 'things had come to an end.' There were the long winter months to be got through before they left, as well as the work and worry of changing house. May would help her, no doubt; she could always count on May; but she knew that she did not want to owe her more than she could help. It was partly a new uprising of dead jealousy, of course, as well as pride refusing dependence upon one who did not belong. But at the back of all there was a more just and generous motive than either of these,--the consciousness that May had given too much already, and should not be called upon for more. Months ahead though it lay, she began presently to think a woman's thoughts about the breaking-up of the home. Little as they possessed of any value in itself, there would be many things, she knew, that they would want to keep. There were certain things, expensive to renew, which still had a flicker of useful life, and others, useless to others as well as themselves, which were yet bone of their bone and flesh of their ancient flesh. She began to make a list in her head, and to value the furniture as well as she knew how. She had been to many a sale in her time, and had a sufficiently good memory of what the things had fetched, as well as of whose house had eventually raked them in. She saw Sandholes full of peering and poking folk, a chattering crowd stretching into the garden and yard, and forming a black procession along the roads of the marsh. She saw traps and heavy carts and laden human beings slowly departing with the stuff of her human life, while the shreds that were left to her, piled and roped on a waiting lorry, looked poorer than ever in the light of day. She saw the garden gravel printed by many boots, and the yard trenched and crossed by wheels. She saw the windows open in a house from which n.o.body looked, and scrubbed, bare floors which seemed to have forsworn the touch of feet. She saw the lorry pa.s.s reluctantly away into the great, homeless place that was the world. And last of all she saw herself and Simon shutting the door that finally shut them out. There was all the difference in ten thousand worlds between the sound of a door that was shutting you in and the sound of the same door shutting you out....

She had always been a still woman, when she had had time to be still, but she found it impossible to be still to-day. She began to walk up and down, listening for Simon's voice, and in the strange room she hurt herself against the furniture, and received little shocks from the cold surface of strange objects and the violent closing-up of the walls. She gave it up after a while, forcing herself to a stand, and it was so that Simon found her when he opened the door at last.

She had a further wait, however, when he found that the trap had managed to oust the car from the coveted place. At first he was rather afraid that the hea.r.s.e-story had earned him too many drinks, but even to marketing eyes the fact was plain. He chuckled as he walked from one to the other, saying "Gox!" and "Did ye ever now?" and "Losh save us!" and "Wha'd ha' thowt it!" The driver was not to be seen, or the wait might have been longer still, but as it was they were mounted presently on the emaciated seats, and Simon jerked up the horse in a last spasm of victorious glee.

For some miles he talked of nothing but the sensation that he had caused in Witham, and how he had found the hea.r.s.e-story everywhere in the town.

"I'd n.o.bbut to turn a corner," he announced proudly, though pretending disgust, "but sure an' certain there'd be somebody waiting to tax me on t'far side! There was Burton, and Wilson, and Danny Allen and a deal more, all on 'em ready wi'--'Well, Simon, and what about yon hea.r.s.e?' I could see 'em oppenin' their mouths half a street off!" he chuckled loudly. "Folk clipped me by t'arm and begged me tell 'em how it was, and t'others rushed out o' shops and fair fell on me as I ganged by!"

"They mun ha' been terble hard set for summat to do," Sarah answered unkindly. "What did you make out wi' Mr. Dent?"

At once the shadow fell again on the fine sun of Simon's success.

"Nay, you may well ax," he growled, "but I'm danged if I rightly know!

He was that queer there was no doing owt wi' him at all. Seemed to be thinking o' summat else most o' the time,--gaping out at winder and smiling at nowt. He was a deal queerer nor me, hea.r.s.e or no hea.r.s.e, and so I tell ye!"

"But you give notice in, didn't you? You likely got that fixed?"

"Well, I did and I didn't, after a manner o' speaking. I kept handing it in like, and he kept handing it back. He said we'd best take a bit more time to think."

"We've had time and plenty, I'm sure!" Sarah sighed,--"ay, that we have!

... I reckon you tellt him about my eyes?"

Simon stirred uneasily when she mentioned her eyes, remembering how they had played in and out of his mind, but never once managed to come to the front.

"Nay, then, I didn't, if you want to know, because I never gitten chanst. I didn't rightly know what to say, neither, come to that. You catched doctor right enough, I suppose?"

"Ay, we hadn't to wait or owt. And he was right kind, he was that!"

"Happen he hadn't a deal to say, after all?" Simon enquired hopefully, and she gave a faint laugh.

"n.o.bbut that if I didn't have an operation right off, I'd be as blind as a barn-door owl by next year!"

Simon said "Gox!" and jerked the horse so violently that it nearly went through the hedge. "Losh, missis, that's bad!" he went on dismally, when he had straightened out. "It's worse than I looked for, by a deal.

I've always been terble feared of operations and such-like. What's to be done about it, d'ye think?"

"Nowt."

"Nay, but dang it!" he cried sharply,--"we can't leave it like yon! If there's owt they can do for you, we mun let them try. They say some folk come out right enough, wi' a bit o' luck."

"Luck isn't much in our way, I doubt," she said, with a sigh, "and it'd mean begging o' somebody, I reckon, and I've had enough o' that. May says there's free spots for such as us, but there's not that much free in this world as I've ever seen. I doubt it'd mean somebody's bra.s.s or other going to pay for it in the end."

"I could ax Will----" Simon began hurriedly, without pausing to think, but she stopped him before the well-known formula was out.

"Nay, then, master, you'll do nowt o' the sort, so that's all there is about it! You're his brother, and you've a right to do as you choose, but I'll never take a penny piece from him if it's n.o.bbut for myself."

"He'd have his hand in his pocket for you right off. He's never been close about bra.s.s and suchlike, hasn't Will."

"Ay, but it's Eliza's bra.s.s as well, you'll think on, and she's close, right enough! She'd see me blind and on t'streets afore she'd lift a hand, and if happen she did lift it, I'd strike it down! Nay, master, you can ax what you like for yourself, but you'll ax nowt for me. As for the farm and Mr. Dent, we're bound to get shot of it now, whatever happens. The sooner things is fixed the better I'll be suited, so I'll thank you to get 'em seen to as soon as you can."

"'Tisn't my fault they're not fixed this very minute!" Simon grumbled, feeling hardly used.... "Did you happen across Eliza in Witham?" he asked her suddenly, after a while.

Sarah laughed faintly again, though this time it was an echo of triumph.

"We'd a few words together in t'caif," she answered tranquilly, "and wi'