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During the next day or two Reuben thought a great deal about Rose Lardner. He made covert enquiries about her in the neighbourhood. He found out that she was an orphan and old Lardner's only surviving relative. He was an extremely prosperous man, and at his death Rose would have all his money. Moreover, rumour gave him a cancer which would carry him off before very long.
Reuben turned over these facts in his mind. He realised what a fine thing it would be for Odiam if he married Rose. Here was the very wife he wanted—of good standing in the neighbourhood, and something of an heiress, young and healthy, and likely to give him stout boys, and also exceedingly attractive in herself.
Under the circumstances he hardly knew what held him back, what made the whole idea vaguely repugnant to him. Surely it could not be his feeling for Alice Jury. The terrible thought suggested itself that his love for Alice would survive all the outward signs of its demolition, that though beaten and killed and destroyed it would haunt him disembodied. That was the secret of its power—its utter lack of corporiety, its independence of the material things a strong man could bend to his will, so that, as it were, one could never lay hands on it, but chased it for ever like a ghost.
Nevertheless, he called at Starvecrow and renewed his impressions of Rose. They did not want much adjustment; he found her as he had found her that first evening—childlike in all things save love, indolent, languorous, and yet with gay bursts of spirit which made her charming. He noticed too how well dressed she was—he admired her stuff gown and neat buttoned boots, so different from what he was accustomed to see on the feet of his womenfolk; he admired the crinkle and gloss of her hair, so beautifully waved and brushed, and scented with some lotion—her hands, too, well kept and white with shining pink nails, her trim muslin collar, the clover scent of her garments ... it was all new, and gave him somehow a vague feeling of self-respect.
When they were alone she was as eager as ever for his love. He had a precious ten minutes with her in the parlour at Starvecrow, at the end of which in came old Lardner, with talk of crops and beasts. Reuben considered that he had some knowledge of farming—which was a long way for him to go—and took him into confidence about some of Odiam's affairs. The farm was still causing him anxiety, and he felt in need of ready money. He wanted to establish a milk round, with a dairy shop in Rye, but he could not spare the capital.
That visit was the first of several others. Starvecrow took the place of Cheat Land—indeed, he seldom went near Cheat Land now. Rose gave him all the refuge he wanted from the vexings and thwartings of his daily life. She was not, like Alice, a counter-irritant, but a sweet drowse of tenderness and beauty in which he forgot his disappointment, thinking of nothing but the lovely woman he caressed.
She gave him sympathy, too, in a childlike way. She did not like it if he interrupted his love-making to tell her about his plans for Boarzell, but at other moments she seemed to enjoy hearing him talk of his ambition; and often, when the jar and failure of things depressed him, she would take him in her arms, and soothe him like a baby with—"Of course you'll have Boarzell, my Reuben; of course it will be yours—you're so strong and masterful, you're bound to get all you want."
Her delight in him never seemed to fail. Sometimes it seemed to him strange that the difference in their ages did not affect her more. She never gave him a hint that she thought him too old for her. He once told her that he was nearly fifty, but she had answered with a happy laugh that she did not like boys.
As a matter of fact, Reuben at fifty was a lover of whom any girl might still be proud. If a little grey had come into his hair, it had merely been to give it the gleam of polished iron, and contrast it more effectively with the swarthiness of his skin. His teeth were as white and even as when he was twenty, for he had never risked spoiling them by too much tobacco—his eyes, dark and bright, were like a boy's; his broad back was straight, and his powerful arms could lift even the plump Rose to his shoulder. He once carried her on his shoulder all the way from Tide Barn to the beginning of Starvecrow lane.
Towards the end of August, Reuben asked Rose to marry him.
The request was not so much the outcome of passion as might have been imagined from the form it took. It was true that he was deeply enamoured of her, but it was also true that for three months he had endured the intoxication of her presence without definitely, or even indefinitely, claiming her for his own. He had held himself back till he had thoroughly weighed and pondered her in relation to his schemes—he was not going to renounce Alice for a wife who would be herself a drawback in another way.
However, though he had never deceived himself that Rose's sympathetic tendernesses meant any real sharing of his ambition, he was soon convinced that to marry her would be materially to help himself in the battle which was now dragging a little on his side. He wanted ready money—her settlements would provide that; and her heirship of Lardner held out dazzling hopes for the future. He wanted children—where could he find a healthier mother? He wanted to raise the dignity of Odiam, and could hardly have thought of a better means than marriage with the niece of one of the wealthiest and most important farmers in the parish. To crown all, he gave himself an adorable woman, young, lovely, tender, and gay. This consideration could not have dragged him contrary to his ambition, but combined with it, it could give to an otherwise very practical and material plan all the heats of passion and the glories of romance.
The only disappointment was Rose's reception of his offer. At first she was unaffectedly surprised. She had looked upon the whole affair as a flirtation, of which she had had several, and had never expected it to take such a serious turn.
Even when she had recovered from her surprise, she refused to give him an answer. He became suddenly alarmed lest she thought him too old, and pressing her for her reasons, found that the real matter was that she did not want to sacrifice her freedom.
Wot do you mean, sweetheart? D?an't you love me?
Of course I love you—but it doesn't follow I want to belong to you. Can't we go on as we are?
You queer me, Rose. How can we go on as we are?—it's like walking on a road that never leads nowhere.
Well, that's very nice—I don't always want to go somewhere every time I take a walk, I much prefer just wandering.
I d?an't.
Because you're so practical and business-like, and I'm afraid you'd try and make me practical and business-like too. That's why I said I wanted to be free.
You shall be free, Rose—I promise you. You shall do wotsumdever you please.
Absolutely 'wotsumdever'?
Yes—wudin reason, of course.
Ah, that's it. Your reason mightn't be my reason.
You wudn't find me unreasonable, dear.
Well, I shall have to think it over.
She thought it over for two months, during which Reuben suffered all the torments of his lot. She soon came to realise and appreciate her powers; she dangled hopes and fears with equal zest before his eyes, she used his anxieties to stoke the furnaces of his passion, till she had betrayed him into blazes and explosions which he looked on afterwards with uneasy shame.
Once in sick amazement at himself he took refuge at Cheat Land, and sat for an hour in Alice Jury's kitchen, watching her sew. But the springs of his confidence were dried, he could not tell Alice what he felt about Rose. She knew, of course. All the neighbourhood knew he was in love with Rose Lardner, and watched the progress of his courtship with covert smiles.
Rose used often to come to Odiam, where she was at first rather shy of Reuben's children, all of whom were older than herself. In time, however, she outgrew her shyness, and became of an exceedingly mad and romping disposition. She ran about the house like a wild thing, she dropped blackberries into Caro's cream, she tickled Pete's neck with wisps of hay, she danced in the yard with Jemmy. Reuben grew desperate—he felt the hopelessness of capturing this baby who played games with his children; and yet Rose was in some ways so much older than they—she loved to say risky things in front of the innocent Caro, and howled with laughter when she could not understand—she loved to prod and baffle the two boys, who in this respect were nearly as inexperienced as their sister. Then, on the walk home with Reuben, over Boarzell, she would retail these feats of hers with gusto, she would invite his kisses, sting up his passion—she tormented him with her extraordinary combinations of childishness and experience, shyness and abandonment, innocence and corruption.
In time the state of his own mind reduced Reuben to silence about his longings. He somehow lost the power of picturing himself married to this turbulent, bewildering creature, half-woman, half-child. He clung to her in silent kisses; leading her home over Boarzell, he would suddenly turn and smother her in his arms, while his breast heaved with griefs and sighings he had not known in the earlier weeks of his courtship.
Rose noticed this difference, and it piqued her. She began to miss his continual protestations. Sometimes she tried to stir them up again, but her bafflings had reacted on herself; she handled him clumsily, he was too mazed to respond to her flicks. Then she became sulky, irritable, slightly tyrannous—even stinting her kisses.
One night early in October he was taking her home. They had crossed Boarzell, and were walking through the lanes that tangle the valley north of Udimore. She walked with her arm conventionally resting on his, her profile demure in the starlight. He felt tired, not in his body, but in his mind—somehow life seemed very aimless and gloomy; he despised himself because he craved for her arms, for her light thoughtless sympathy.
Why d?an't you speak to me, Rose?
I was thinking.
Wot about?
Oh, clothes and things.
He stopped suddenly in their walk, as he had often done, and seized her in his arms, swinging her off her feet, burying his face in her wraps to kiss her neck. She kicked and fought him like a wild cat, and at last he dropped her.
Why w?an't you let me kiss you?
Because I won't.
She walked quickly, almost running, and he had to stride to keep up with her.
You're justabout cruel, he said furiously.
And so are you.
Wot have I done?
You've changed your mind about wanting to marry me.
He stared at her with his mouth open.
Rose....
Well, don't gape at me. You know you have.
I justabout haven't. It's you——
It isn't me. I only asked for a little time to think it over, and then you go and cool off.
I—cool off! My dear, I dudn't ever. I never understood—you're such a tedious liddle wild thing.
Well, do you want to marry me?
Rose!
And you'll let me do as I like?
Rose, marry me.
Very well—I will. But it's funny I should want to.
Then suddenly her expression changed. Her eyes half closed, her lips parted, and she held out her arms to him with a laugh like a sob.
Reuben and Rose were married in the January of '70. It was the earliest date compatible with the stocking of her wardrobe, a business which immediately absorbed her to the exclusion of everything else.
Meantime Reuben, having repapered the parlour and given a new coat of whitewash to the best bedroom ceiling, discussed settlements with old Lardner. These did not turn out as large as he had hoped—the old man was close, and attempts on his generosity only resulted in embarrassing doubts as to the disinterestedness of his son-in-law's affections. Reuben comforted himself with the thought that Lardner most certainly had a cancer.
At the wedding Rose fairly dazed the onlookers. She wore a dress of heavy white satin, with a white lace veil—and a bustle. It was the first bustle that had ever been seen in Peasmarsh, or even in Rye. In itself it was devastating enough, but it soon acquired a prophetic and metaphorical significance which made it even more impressive. Spectators saw in it the forecast of Odiam's downfall—"He can't stand that," said Brazier, the new man at Totease, "she's a Jezebubble."—"Only it ?un't her head as she's tired this time," said Ticehurst.—"She shud have worn it in front of her, and then we shud have bin interested," said Cooper of Kitchenhour.
Alice Jury and her father were in church. Reuben saw them as he marched up the aisle with an enormous flower in his buttonhole, accompanied by Ginner of Socknersh as his best man. It struck him that she looked more pretty and animated than usual, in a woolly red dress and a little fur cap under which her eyes were bright as a robin's. Even then he felt a little offended and perplexed by her behaviour—she should have drooped—it would have been more becoming if she had drooped.
The remnants of his family were in a front pew—Pete with an elaborately curled forelock, Jemmy casting the scent of cheap hair oil into the prevalent miasma of camphor and moth-killer, and between the two boys, Caro in an unbecoming hat which she wore at a wrong angle, while her dark restless eyes devoured Rose's creamy smartness, from her satin shoes to the wave of curling-irons in her hair. Harry had been left at home—he was in an impossible mood, tormented by some dark current of memory, wandering from room to room as he muttered—"Another wedding—another wedding—we're always having weddings in this house."
After the ceremony nearly a hundred guests were fed at Starvecrow. All the most important farmers of the neighbourhood were there, except of course Realf of Grandturzel. Rose was like her name-flower, flushed and scented. Very different from his earlier bride, she sat beside Reuben with head erect and smiling lips—she drank with everyone, and the wine deepened the colour of her cheeks and made her eyes like stars. She talked, she laughed, she ate, she was so happy that her glances, full of bold languor, swept round the table, resting on all present as well as the chosen man—she was a gay wife.
Dancing at weddings was dying out as a local fashion, so when the breakfast was over the guests melted away, having eaten and drunk themselves into a desire for sleep. Reuben's family went home. He and Rose lingered a little with her uncle, then as the January night came crisping into the sky and fields, he drove her to Odiam in his gig, as long ago he had driven Naomi. She leaned against his shoulder, for he wanted both hands for his horse, and her hair tickled his neck. She was silent for about the first time that day, and as eager for the kisses he could give her while he drove as Naomi had been shy of them. Above in the cold black sky a hundred pricks of fire shuddered like sparks—the lump of Boarzell was blocked against a powder of stars.
At Odiam Rose shook off her seriousness. Supper was ready, and undaunted by the huge meal she had already eaten, she sat down to it with a hearty appetite. Her step-children stared at her curiously—Rose had a gust of affection for them. Poor things!—their lives had been so crude and dull and innocent. She must give them a little brightness now, soften the yoke of Reuben's tyranny—that girl Caro, for instance, she must give her some pretty clothes and show her how to arrange her hair becomingly.
Supper was a very gay meal—the gayest there had ever been at Odiam. Rose laughed and talked, as at Starvecrow, and soon her husband and the boys were laughing with her. Some of the things she said were rather daring, and Caro had only a dim idea of what she meant, but Rose's eyes rolling mischievously under the long lashes, and the tip of her tongue showing between her lips, gave her words a devilish bite even if only half understood. Somehow the whole atmosphere of the Odiam kitchen was changed—it was like the lifting of a curtain, the glimpsing of a life where all was gay, where love and ambition and all solemn things were the stuff of laughter.
The boys beat the handles of their knives on the table and rolled in their chairs with wide-open mouths as if they would burst; Reuben leaned back with a great pride and softening in his eyes, round which many hard lines had traced themselves of late; Caro's lips were parted and she seemed half enchanted, half bewildered by the other woman's careless merriment. Only Harry took no interest and looked dissatisfied—"Another wedding," he mumbled as he dribbled his food unnoticed over the cloth—"we're always having weddings in this house."
It was strange that during this gay meal the strongest link was forged between Rose and Caro. Two natures more utterly unlike it would be hard to find—Caro's starved ignorance of love and aged familiarity with dustier matters made her the antithesis of Rose, a child in all things save those of the affections; but the two women's hearts met in their laughter. It was Rose who invited, Caro who responded, for Rose in spite of her years and inexperience had the one advantage which made her the older of the two. She was drawn to Caro partly from essential kindness, partly because she appreciated the luxury of pitying her—Caro responded with all the shy devotion of a warped nature going out towards one who enjoys that for which it unconsciously pines. Rose's beauty, jollity, and happiness made her a goddess to the less fortunate girl.
After supper Rose turned towards her.
Will you come up and help me unpack?
Caro flushed with pleasure—a light had kindled in her grey life, and she found herself looking forward to days of basking.
They went up together to the huge low-raftered bedroom, which struck horribly cold.
Ugh! said Rose—"no fire!"
But it's a bedroom.
That's no reason for not having a fire. I shall freeze. Let's have the servant up to light one.
Oh, no. I'll light it; Mary's busy clearing the table. But I reckon as f?ather w?an't be pleased.
I'll make him pleased. You leave father to me for the future.
Caro fetched some wood and turf and laid the fire, to which Rose applied a match, feeling that by this she had done her share of the work. Then they began to unpack. There were two trunks full of clothes, and Rose complicated matters by refusing to take things out as they came but diving after various articles she particularly wanted.
I want my blue negleegy—I must show you my blue negleegy, she panted, up to her elbows in underlinen.
Oh, here it is! what do you think of it?
It's silk! said Caro in a hoarse whisper.
Of course it is—and the very best silk too. I'll put it on. Please undo my dress.
Caro helped her off with her wedding-dress, and after having recovered her breath, which she lost completely at the sight of the lace on her chemise, she helped her arrange the "negleegy," and watched her open-mouthed as she posed in it before the fragment of looking-glass.
Isn't it chick? said Rose, "I got it in Hastings—they say it is copied from a Paris model. Now let's go on with the unpacking."
They went on—that is to say Rose leaned back in her chair and directed Caro as she took the things out of the trunks. The girl was fairly bewildered by what she saw—the laced chemises, the flounced petticoats, the dainty nightgowns with transparent necks. "But you'll show through," she said in tones of horror as she displayed one of these, and could not understand why Rose rolled in her chair with laughter.
There were little pots of cream and bottles of hair-lotion, there were ebony-backed brushes, patent leather shoes, kid gloves, all sorts of marvels which Caro had seen nowhere but in shops. As she unpacked she felt a kind of soreness in her heart. Why should Rose have all these beautiful things, these laces, these perfumes, these silks and ribbons, while Caro wore nothing but stuff and calico or smelt of anything sweeter than milk? As she glanced at Rose, leaning back in the most comfortable chair to be found in that uncomfortable room—the firelight dancing on the silken ripples of her gown, her neck and arms gleaming through clouds of lace—the soreness woke into a pain. Rose had something more even than silks and laces. She had love. It was love that made her hold her chin so proudly, it was love that made her cheeks flush and her eyes glow. And no one had ever loved Caro—she had never heard a man's voice in tenderness, or felt even so much as a man's hand fondle hers....
Caro, would you mind brushing my hair?
Rose was taking out the pins, and curls and tendrils of hair began to fall on her shoulders. Caro took the brush, and swept it over the soft mass, gleaming like spun glass. A subtle perfume rose from it, the rub of it on her hand was like silk. Rose's eyes closed as the brush stroked her, and her lips parted slowly into a smile.
Then suddenly, without warning, all this love and happiness and possession became too much for Caro—she dropped the brush and the scented hair, and burst into passionate tears.
Reuben at once laid out his wife's money to the best advantage. He bought twenty cows, good milkers, and started a dairy business in Rye. A shop was opened near the Landgate, which sold milk, butter, cream, and eggs from Odiam. He also tried to establish a milk-round in Rye, sending circulars to inns and private houses. He engaged a young woman to serve in the shop, and boys to drive his milk-carts. This meant a big expenditure, and almost all Rose's money was swallowed up by it.
Reuben was surprised at Lardner's attitude. The old man refused to look upon this spending of his niece's dowry as an excellent investment, which would soon bring in returns a hundredfold—he would have preferred to see her money lying safe and useless in Lewes Old Bank, and accused Backfield of greed and recklessness. Reuben in his turn was disgusted with Lardner's parsimony, and would have quarrelled with him had he not been afraid of an estrangement. The farmer of Starvecrow could not speak without all sorts of dreadful roars and clearings in his throat, and Reuben hopefully observed the progress of the cancer.
Rose herself did not much care how her money was spent as long as she had the things she wanted. First of these at present was Reuben's love, and that she had in plenty. She was a perpetual source of delight to him; her beauty, her astounding mixture of fire and innocence, her good humour, and her gaiety were even more intoxicating than before marriage. He felt that he had found the ideal wife. As a woman she was perfect, so perfect that in her arms he could forget her short comings as a comrade. After all, what did it matter if she failed to plumb the depths of his desire for things outside herself, as long as she herself was an undying source of enchantment?—smoothing away the wrinkles of his day with her caresses, giving him love where she could not give him understanding, her heart where she could not give her brain. During the hours of work and fret he would long for her, for the quiet warm evenings, and the comfort which the wordless contact of her brought. She made him forget his heaviness, and gather strength to meet his difficulties, giving him draughts of refreshment for to-morrow's journey in the desert.
His times were still anxious. Even if the milk-round turned out a success, it was bound to be a loss to him during the first year. A multiplication of servants also meant for a man like Reuben a multiplication of trials. He would have liked to do all the work himself, and could trust no one to do it properly for him. His underlings, with their detached attitude towards the farm, were a perpetual source of anxiety and contempt. His heart sickened for those stalwart sons he had dreamed of in the days of his first marriage—a dream which mocked him daily with its pitiful materialisation in the shred of family that still worked for Odiam. Reuben longed for Rose to have a child, but the months passed, and she had no favourable answer to his repeated questionings, which struck her at first as amusing, later as irritating, and at last—at the suggestion of one or two female friends—as indelicate.
She herself had no wish for motherhood, and expressed this so openly that in time Reuben began to entertain dark doubts of her, and to feel that she would avoid it if she could. Yet she in herself was so utterly sweet that he could not find it in his heart to be angry, or use anything but tender remonstrance when she vexed him with her attitude towards life in general and marriage in particular.
She gulped at pleasure, and she gave him so much that he could not deny her what she craved for, though the mere decorativeness of her tastes amazed and sometimes appalled him. She coaxed him to buy her new curtains and chair-covers for the parlour, and to turn it into a room which could be used, where she could lounge in her pretty frocks, and entertain her women-friends—of whom she had a startling number—to afternoon tea, with cream, and little cakes that cost an amount of money altogether disproportionate to the space that they filled in one's inside. She demanded other entertainments too—visits to Rye, and even to Hastings, and jaunts to fairs other than the sanctioned one on Boarzell.
Reuben was delighted with her fashionable clothes, the dainty things with which she managed to surround herself, her fastidious care for her person, her pomadings, her soapings, her scentings—but he sometimes had vague doubts of this beautiful, extravagant, irresponsible creature. He was like a man stirring in a happy dream, realising in the midst of it that he dreams, and must some day awake.
The year '71 was on the whole a bad one. The summer was parched, the autumn sodden, and the winter frozen. Reuben's oats after some excellent promises failed him abruptly, as was the way with crops on Boarzell. His wheat was better in quality but poor in quantity, his mangolds had the rot, and his hops, except for the old field by the lane, were brown and ragged with blight.
This would have been bad enough in any year, but in times when he bore the burden of his yet profitless milk-round it was only a little short of catastrophe. Making every allowance for a first year, that milk-round had disappointed him. He found private custom hard to win, and even the ceasing of French dairy supplies, owing to the Franco-Prussian war, did not bring him the relief he had hoped. One or two small farms on the borders of Rye catered in dairy stuff for its inhabitants, and he found them hard to outbid or outwit. Also, owing to the scarcity of grass feed, it was a bad milk year, and poor supplies were put down by consumers to the new milkman, and in more than one case custom was withdrawn.
Reuben faced his adversity with set teeth and a dogged countenance. He had not been farming thirty odd years to be beaten casually by the weather. Scorching heat and blighting cold, the still blanker doom of the trickling, pouring rain—the wind that seeded his corn, and beat down his hay, and flung his hop-bines together in muddled heaps—the pests that Nature breeds by the ten million out of her own putrefyings and misbegettings—all things in life from the lowest maggot to the fiercest storm—he was out to fight them. In challenging Boarzell he had challenged them all.
In time his struggle began to modify his relations with Rose. At first he had told himself that her uselessness was only apparent. Though she herself did no fighting, she gave such rest and refreshment to the soldier that he went forth strengthened to the war. He had almost begun to attribute to her his daily renewed courage, and had once or twice been moved to show his gratitude by acts of expensive indulgence.
Now slowly he began to see that this gratitude was misleading—better receive no comfort from Rose than pay for it too dear. He must make her understand that he could not afford to keep a useless and extravagant wife, however charming she might be. Rose must do her share, as Naomi had done, as his mother had done, as his children had done.
Sometimes he would expostulate with her, and when she met his expostulations with blandishments, he would feel himself yielding, and grow so furious that he would turn upon her in rage and indignation. Rose was not like Naomi; in her own words "she gave as good as she got," and once or twice, for the first time in his life, Reuben found himself in loud and vulgar altercation with a female. He had never before had a woman stand up to him, and the experience was humiliating.
He had used to turn from Boarzell to her for rest, and now he found himself turning from her to Boarzell. It was part of the baffling paradox that the thing he fought should also be the thing he loved, and the battlefield his refuge. Out on the Moor, with the south-west wind rolling over him like the waves of some huge earth-scented sea, he drank in the spirit of conflict, he was swept back into the cleanness and singleness of his warfare. It was then that Boarzell nerved him for its own subduing, stripped his heart of softness, cleansed it of domestic fret. Rose and her love and sweetness were all very well, but he was out for something greater than Rose—he must keep in mind that she was only a part of things. Why, he himself was only a part of things, and in his cravings and softenings must be conquered and brushed aside even as Rose. In challenging Boarzell he had challenged the secret forces of his own body, all the riot of hope and weakness and desire that go to make a man. The battle was not to be won except over the heaped bodies of the slain, and on the summit of the heap would lie his own.
The last piece of land had been exceptionally tough even for Boarzell. It was a high strip, running right across the Moor from the edge of the twenty-acre piece acquired in '67, over the high-road, to the borders of Doozes. The soil was amazingly various—it started in the low grounds almost as clay, with runnels of red water in the irrigation ditches, then passing through a stratum of marl it became limish, grey and brittle, powdering under the spade. Reuben's ploughs tore over it, turning up earth of almost every consistency and colour, till the new ground looked like a smeared palette. Towards Doozes it became clay again, and here oats would grow, sedge-leaved and tulip-rooted, with puffy awns. On the crest was rubble, poor stuff where even the heather seemed to fight for existence.
Reuben struggled untiringly—he tried manure as in his first enterprising days, and a horrible stink of guano told traffic on the road it was passing through Odiam territory. Spades and ploughshares and harrows scored and pulped the earth. Sometimes with breaking back and aching head, the sweat streaming over his skin, he would lift himself stiffly from the plough-handles, and shake his fist at the desert round him. He had never had such a tussle before, and put it down to the fact that he was now for the first time on the high ground, on the hard and sterile scab of the marl, where it seemed as if only gorse would grow. He felt as if now for the first time he was fighting against odds, his earlier struggles were tame compared with this.
Often in the evenings, when the exhausting work of the day was done, he would wander out on the Moor, seeking as usual rest on the field of his labours. The tuft of firs would grow black and featureless against the dimming sky, and stars would hang pale lamps above the fog, which smoked round Boarzell, veiling the fields, till it seemed as if he stood alone on some desert island, in the midst of a shoreless sea. All sounds would be muffled, lights and shadows would blur, and he would be alone with the fir-clump and the stars and the strong smells of his land.
He would wait there till the dew hung in pearls on his clothes and hair, and the damp chills of the night were in his bones. Then he would creep down from the Moor, and go back into the warmth and love of the house—yet with this difference now, that he never quite forgot.
He would wake during the night after cruel dreams of Boarzell stripped of its tilth, relapsed into wildness; for a few agonised moments he would wonder if the dream were true, and if he had not indeed failed. Sometimes he had to get out of bed and steal to the window, to reassure himself with the sight of his diggings and fencings. Then a horrible thought would attack him, that though he had not yet actually failed, he was bound to fail soon, that his task was too much for him, and only one end possible. He would creep back into bed, and lie awake till dawn and the restarting of the wheel.
One comfort was that these evil summers had blighted Grandturzel too. Realf's fruit and grain had both done badly, and he had been unfortunate with his cows, two of which had died of garget. It was now that the characters of the two rivals were contrasted. Realf submitted at once to adversity, cut down his expenses, and practically withdrew from the fight. Ambitious and enterprising when times were good, he was not the man to be still ambitious and enterprising when they were bad. The greatness of his farm was not so much to him as the comfort of his family. He now had a little son, and was anxious that neither he nor Tilly should suffer from bad speculations. He despised Reuben for putting Odiam before his wife and children, and defying adversity at the expense of his household.
He'll do fur himself, he said to Tilly, as he watched her bath the baby before the fire, "and where'll his old farm be then?"
He's more likely to do fur someone else, said Tilly, who knew her father.
Wot about this gal he's married?
I'm sorry fur her.
But she d?an't look as if she wanted it, surelye. I never see anything so smart and well-set-up as she wur in church last Sunday.
Still, I'm sorry fur her—I'm sorry fur any woman as he takes up with. Now, Henry, you can't kiss baby while I'm bathing him.
It sometimes grieved Tilly that she could not do more for her brothers and sister. Pete did not want her help, being quite happy in his work on the farm. But Jemmy and Caro hated their bondage, and she wished she could set them free. Reuben had sternly forbidden his children to have anything to do with the recreant sister, but they occasionally met on the road, or on the footpath across Boarzell. Once Caro had stolen a visit to Grandturzel, and held the baby in her arms, and watched her sister put him to bed; but she was far too frightened of Reuben to come again.
On Reuben's marriage Tilly had hoped that Rose might do something for Caro, and indeed the girl had lately seemed to have a few more treats and pleasures in her life; but from what she had heard and from what she saw, the younger sister was afraid that Rose's good offices were not likely to make for Caro's ultimate happiness. Then comfortable little Tilly would sigh in the midst of her own, and wish that everyone could have what she had been given.
Benjamin occasionally stole afternoons in Rye—if he was discovered there would be furious scenes with Reuben, but he had learned cunning, and also, being of a sporting nature, was willing to take risks. Some friends of his were building a ship down at the Camber. Week by week he watched her grow, watched the good timber fill in her ribs, watched her decks spread themselves, watched her masts rise, and at last smelt the good smell of her tarring. She was a three-masted schooner, and her first voyage was to be to the Canaries. Her builders drank many a toast with Backfield's truant son, who gladly risked his father's blows to be with them in their work and hearty boozing. He forgot the farmyard smells he hated in the shipyard smells he loved, and his slavery in oaths and rum—with buckets of tar and coils of rope, and rousing chanties and stories of strange ships.
Next spring the news came to Odiam that Benjamin had run away to sea.
It was Rose who had to tell Reuben.
Benjamin had given no one the faintest hint of his plans; indeed for the last two or three weeks his behaviour had been unusually good. Then one morning, when Reuben was at Robertsbridge market, he disappeared—Handshut could not find him to take his place in the lambing shed. Rose was angry, for she had wanted young Handshut to hang some curtains for her—one cause of disagreement between her and Reuben was her habit of coaxing the farm-hands to do odd jobs about the house.
That same evening, before her husband was back, a letter came for Rose. It was from Benjamin at Rye, announcing that he was sailing that night in the Rother Lady for Las Palmas. He was sick of the farm, and could not stand it any longer. Would Rose tell his father?
Rose was not sorry to see the last of Benjamin, whom she had always despised as a coarse lumpkinish youth, whose clothes smelt strongly either of pitch or manure. But she dreaded breaking the news to Reuben. She disliked her husband's rages, and now she would have to let one loose. Then suddenly she thought of something, and a little smile dimpled the corners of her mouth.
Reuben came in tired after a day's prodding and bargaining in Robertsbridge market-place. Rose, like a wise woman, gave him his supper, and then, still wise, came and sat on his knee.
Ben ...
Well, liddle Rose.
I've some bad news for you.
Wot?
Jemmy's gone for a sailor.
He suddenly thrust her from him, and the lines which had begun to soften on his face as he held her, reappeared in their old harshness and weariness.
Gone!
Yes. I had a letter from him this evening. He couldn't stand Odiam any longer, so he ran away. He's sailed for a place called Palma.
Reuben did not speak. His hands were clenched on the arms of his chair, and for the first time Rose noticed that he looked old. A faint feeling of disgust came over her. She shivered, and took a step backwards as if she would leave him. Then her warm good nature and her gratitude to the man who had made her so happy, drove away the unnatural mood. She came close, and slipped her soft arms round his neck, pressing her lips to his.
He groaned.
You mustn't fret, Reuben.
How can I help it?—they're all gone now save one ... my boys....
Perhaps there'll be others.
She had slid back to his knee, and the weight and warmth of her comforted him a little. He lifted his head quickly at her words.
Others?
Yes, why not?
Her bold sweet eyes were looking into his and her mouth was curved like a heart.
Rose, Rose—my dear, my liddle dear—you d?an't mean——
Of course I mean. You needn't look so surprised. Such a thing has been known to happen.
D?an't go laughing at me, but tell me—when?
In October.
Oh, God! oh, God!
His rapture and excitement alarmed her. His eyes blazed—he threw back his head and laughed in ecstasy. Then he seized her, and crumpled her to him, covering her face, her neck, her hair, her ears, with kisses, murmuring broken phrases of adoration and gratitude.
Rose was definitely frightened, and broke free with some violence.
Oh, stop it, Ben! can't you see you're spoiling my dress? Why should you get in such a taking? You've had children before, and they've all been failures—I expect this one will only be like the rest.
Rose's child was born towards the end of October. Once more Reuben had a son, and as he looked down on the little red hairless thing all his hopes and dreams were built anew. He had always lived too near the earth to let experience thump him into cynicism. He raised as glorious dreams over this baby as he had raised over the others, and seen crumble into ashes. Indeed, the fact that his earlier hopes had failed made him warm himself more gratefully at this rekindling. He saw himself at last raised out of the pit of difficulty—he would not lose this boy as he had lost the others, he would perhaps be softer and more indulgent, he would at all events be wiser, and the child should indeed be a son to him and to Odiam. "Unto Us—Reuben and Odiam—a child is born; unto Us a son is given."
He was soon confirmed in his idea that the birth had brought him luck. Before little David was a week old, the welcome news came that Lardner had died. For some time he had been able to swallow only milk food, and his speech had been reduced to a confused roaring, but his death at this juncture seemed to Reuben a happy coincidence, an omen of good fortune for himself and his son.
He was so pleased that he forgot to veil his pleasure before Rose, whose grief reminded him of the fact that Lardner was a near and dear relation, whose death must be looked upon as a chastisement from heaven. In a fit of compunction for his behaviour, he ordered a complete suit of mourning, in which he attended the funeral. He was soft and benign to all men now, and soothed Rose's ruffled spirit by showing himself to her in all the glory of a top-hat with crape weepers before setting out for Starvecrow.
He himself had helped plan the obsequies, which were carried out with all possible pomp by a Rye undertaker. After the ceremony there was a funeral meal at Starvecrow, where sedate joints and solemn whiskies were partaken of in the right spirit by the dozen or so men and women who were privileged to hear old Lardner's will. This was read by the deceased's lawyer, and one or two pleased malicious glances were darted at Reuben from under decorously lowered lids. He sat with his fists doubled upon his knees, hearing as if in a nightmare:
"I bequeath the farm of Starvecrow, with all lands, stock, and tools pertaining thereto, also the house and fixtures, together with seven thousand pounds to Henry Robert Crick of Lone Mills, Ontario, Canada, my dear son by Marion Crick.... My household furniture and fifty pounds free of legacy duty I bequeath to my niece, Rose Backfield, wife of Reuben Backfield of Odiam."
Reuben felt dazed and sick, the solemn faces of the mourners seemed to leer at him, he was seized by a contemptuous hatred of his kind. There was some confused buzzing talk, but he did not join in it. He shook hands deliriously with the lawyer, muttered something about having to get back, and elbowed his way out of the room. Pete had driven over to fetch him in his gig, as befitted the dignity of a yeoman farmer and nephew-by-marriage of the deceased, but Reuben angrily bade him go home alone. He could not sit still, he must walk, stride off his fury, the frenzy of rage and disgust and disappointment that consumed him.
What business had old Lardner to have a natural son? Never had the laws of morality seemed to Reuben so august and necessary as then, or their infringement more contemptible. He was filled with a righteous loathing of this crapulous libertine who perpetuated the vileness of some low intrigue by bequeathing his worldly goods to his bastard. Meantime his virtuously married niece was put off with fifty pounds and some trashy furniture. Reuben fairly grovelled before the seventh commandment that afternoon.
He staggered blindly along the road. His head swam with rage, and also, it must be confessed, with something else—for he was not used to drinking whisky, which some obscure local tradition considered the only decent beverage at funerals. His face was flushed, and every now and then something would be whirled round by the wind and whip his cheeks and blind him momentarily in a black cloud. At first he was too confused to grapple with it, but when two long black arms suddenly wound themselves about his neck, nearly choking him, he remembered his hat with the crape weepers, and his rage from red-hot became white-hot and cinerating. He tore off the hat with its long black tails, and flung it into the ditch with a volley of those emasculate oaths which are all the swearing of a Sussex man.
Afterwards he felt better, but he was still fuming when he came to Odiam, and dashed up straight to Rose's bedroom, where she lay with the ten-days-old David and a female friend from Rye, who had come in to hear details about her confinement. Both, not to say all three, were startled by Reuben's sudden entrance, crimson and hatless, his collar flying, the dust all over him.
Here! Wot d'you think? he shouted; "if that old man ?un't left all his money to a bastard."
Don't be so excited, Ben, said Rose; "you've no business to come bursting in here like this."
Remember your wife's delicate, said the lady friend.
Well, wot I want to know is why you dudn't tell me all this afore.
How could I? I didn't know how uncle was going to leave his money.
You might have found out, and not let me in fur all this. Here I've bin and gone and spent all your settlements on a milk-round, which I'd never have done if I hadn't thought summat more 'ud be coming in later.
Well, I can't help it. I expect that as uncle knew I was well provided for, married and settled and all that, he thought he'd rather leave his stuff to someone who wasn't.
"I like that—and you the most expensive woman to keep as ever was. Hold your tongue, Ben. I'm surprised at you.""
"I justabout will speak. A purty mess you've got me into. You ought to have told me before we married as he had a son out in Canada.
I didn't know. This is the first I've heard of it. Anyhow, you surely don't mean to say you married me for my money.
Well, I wouldn't have married you if you hadn't got none.
For Shame! said the lady friend.
Rose burst into tears, and young David, interrupted in the midst of an excellent meal, sent up a piercing wail.
You'd better go downstairs till you know how to speak to your wife properly, said the female from Rye.
My wife's deceived me! shouted Reuben. "I made sure as she'd come in fur thousands of pounds when old Lardner died, and all she's got out of him is fifty pounds and his lousy furniture."
Furniture? said Rose, brisking up; "why from what you said I thought there was nothing. I could do with some furniture. I want a bedstead with brass knobs."
Well, you shan't have it. I'll justabout sell the whole lot. You can't prevent me.
Rose's sobs burst forth afresh. Her friend ran up to her and took her in her arms, badly squeezing poor David, who became purple and entirely animal in his remonstrances.
Then the two women fairly stormed at Reuben. They told him he was a money-grubber, an unnatural father, that he had been drinking, that he ought to be ashamed of himself, that he had only got what he deserved. Reuben tried to stand up to them, but Rose had an amazing power of invective, and her friend, who was a spinster, but sometimes forgot it, filled in the few available pauses so effectively that in the end the wretched husband was driven from the room, feeling that the world held even worse things than wealthy and perfidious libertines.
Of course there was a reconciliation. Such things had begun to loom rather large in Reuben's married life. He had never had reconciliations with Naomi—the storms had not been fierce enough to warrant a special celebration of the calms. But he and Rose were always being reconciled. At first he had looked upon these episodes as sweets of matrimony, more blessed than any amount of honeymoon, but now he had gone a stage further and saw them merely as part of the domestic ritual—that very evening when he held Rose and the baby together in his big embrace he knew that in a day or two he would be staling the ceremony by another repetition.
He now began to crave for her active interest in his concerns. Hitherto he had not much missed it, it had been enough for him if when he came in tired and dispirited from his day's work, she had kissed him and rumpled back the hair from his forehead and called him her "poor old man." Her caresses and sympathy had filled the gap left by her help and understanding. But now he began to want something more. He saw the hollowness of her endearments, for she did nothing to make his burden lighter. She refused to realise the seriousness of his position—left stranded with an under taking which he would never have started if he had not been certain of increased capital in the near future. She was still extravagant and fond of pleasure, she either could not or would not master the principles of economy; she saw the fat lands of Odiam round her, and laughed at her husband when he told her that he was crippled with expenses, and in spite of crops and beasts and barns must live as if he were a poor man.
Of course, he had been rash—he saw now that he had been a fool to speculate with the future. But who could have foretold that heir of Lardner's?—no one had ever heard of him in Peasmarsh, and most people were as astonished as Reuben though not so disgusted. Sometimes he had an uneasy feeling that Lardner himself had not thought much about his distant son till a year or two ago. He remembered how the old man had disapproved of the way Rose's settlements were spent, and horrible conjectures would assail him that some earlier will had been revoked, and Rose disinherited because her uncle did not wish to put more money into her husband's pocket.
After all, fifty pounds and some furniture was very little to leave his only niece, who had lived with him, and had been married from his house. It was nonsense to plead the excuse that she was comfortably settled and provided for—the old man knew that Backfield had made a desperate plunge and could not recoup himself properly without ready money. He must have drawn up his will in the spirit of malice—Reuben could imagine him grinning away in his grave. "Well, Ben Backfield, I've justabout sold you nicely, haven't I?—next to no capital, tedious heavy expenses, and a wife who d?an't know the difference between a shilling and a soverun. You thought you'd done yourself unaccountable well, old feller, I reckon. Now you've found out your mistake. And you can't git even wud me where I am. He! He!"
Reuben would imagine the corpse saying all sorts of insulting things to him, and he had horrible nightmares of its gibes and mockery. One night Rose woke in the dubious comfort of the new brass bed—which she had wheedled Reuben into sparing from the auction—to find her husband kneeling on his pillow and pinning some imaginary object against the wall while he shouted—"I've got you, you old grinning ghosty—now we'll see who's sold!"
She thought this immensely funny, and retailed it with glee to her female friends who continued to invade the place. The multitude of these increased as time went by, for Rose had the knack of attaching women to herself by easy bonds. She was extremely confidential on intimate subjects, and she was interested in clothes—indeed in that matter she was even practical, and a vast amount of dressmaking was done on the kitchen table, much to the disorganisation of Caro's cooking.
Sometimes there would be males too, and Reuben found that he could be jealous on occasion. It annoyed him to see a young counter-jumper from Rye sitting in the parlour with an unmanly tea-cup, and he would glare on such aristocracy as a bank-clerk or embryo civil servant, whose visits Rose considered lent a glamour to Odiam. Like a wise woman she used her husband's jealousy to her own advantage. She soon grew extremely skilful in manipulating it, and by its means wrung a good deal out of him which would not otherwise have been hers.
It was true that her young men were not always on the spot when she wanted them most, but on these occasions she used the drover Handshut, a comely, well-set-up young fellow, of independent manners. Reuben more than once had to drive him out of the kitchen.
I w?an't have my lads fooling it in the house, he said to his wife, when he found her winding a skein of wool off Handshut's huge brown paws—"they've work enough to do outside wudout spannelling after you women."
Rose smiled to herself, and when she next had occasion to punish Reuben, invited his drover to a cup of tea.
Then there was an angry scene, stormings and tears, regrets, taunts, and abuse—and another reconciliation.
In time, as these battles became more usual, the family were forced to take sides. Peter supported Reuben, Caro supported Rose. There had been an odd kind of friendship between the downtrodden daughter and the gay wife ever since they had unpacked the latter's trunks together on her wedding night and Caro had cried because Rose had what she might never have.
Rose approved of this attitude—she liked to be envied; also Caro was useful to her in many ways, helping her in the house, taking the burden of many irksome duties off her shoulders, leaving her free to entertain her friends or mix complexion washes. Moreover, there was something in Caro which appealed in itself, a certain heavy innocence which tickled the humour of the younger, more-experienced woman. Once her stepdaughter had asked her what it felt like to be kissed, which had sent Rose into rockings of laughter and a carnival of reminiscence. She liked to dazzle this elderly child with her "affairs," she liked to shock her a little too. She soon discovered that Caro was deeply scandalised at the thought of a married woman having men friends to visit her, so she encouraged the counter-jumpers and the clerks for Caro's benefit as well as Reuben's.
It never occurred to her to throw these young people together, and give the girl a chance of fighting her father and satisfying the vague longings for adventure and romance which had begun to put torment into her late twenties. She often told her it was a scandal that she had never been allowed to know men, but her own were too few and useful to be sacrificed to the forlorn. Besides, Caro had an odd shy way with men which sometimes made them laugh at her. She had little charm, and though not bad-looking in a heavy black-browed style, she had no feminine arts, and always appeared to the very worst advantage.
Those were not very good times for Caro. She envied Rose, and at the same time she loved her, as women will so often love those they envy. Rose's attitude was one of occasional enthusiasm and occasional neglect. Sometimes she would give her unexpected treats, make her presents of clothes, or take her to a fair or to see the shops; at others she would seem to forget all about her. She thought Caro a poor thing for not standing up to Reuben, and despised her for her lack of feminine wiles. At the same time she would often be extremely confidential, she would pour out stories of love and kisses by moonlight, of ardent words, of worship, of ecstasy, and send Caro wandering over strange paths, asking strange questions of herself and fate, and sometimes—to the other's delight—of Rose.
Wot do you do to make a man kiss you?
Oh, I dunno. I just look at him like this with my eyes half shut. Then if that isn't enough I part my lips—so.
The two women had been bathing. It was one of Rose's complaints that Odiam did not make enough provision for personal cleanliness in the way of baths and tubs. Reuben objected if she made the servant run up and downstairs ten times or so with jugs of hot water to fill a wash-tub in her bedroom—they had once had a battle royal about it, during which Rose had said some humorous things about her man's washing—so in summer she relieved the tension by bathing in the Glotten brook, where it ran temporarily limpid and reclused at the foot of the old hop-garden. She had persuaded Caro to join her in this adventure—according to her ideas it was not becoming for a woman to bathe alone; so Caro had conquered her objections to undressing behind a bush, and tasted for the first time the luxury of a daily, or all but daily, bath.
Now they were dry and dressed once more, all except their stockings, for Rose loved to splash her bare feet in the water—she adored the caress of water on her skin. It was a hot day, the sun blinked through the heavy green of the sallows, dabbling the stream with spots and ripples of light. June had come, with a thick swarthiness in the fields, and the scent of hayseed scorching into ripeness.
Rose leaned back against a trunk, a froth of fine linen round her knees. She splashed and kicked her feet in the stream.
Yes—I've only to look at a man like this ... and he always does it.
But not now! cried Caro.
What do you mean by 'not now'?
Now you're married.
Oh, no—I'm talking of before. All the same....
Wot!
Nothing. You'd be shocked.
Caro looked gloomily at the water. She did not like being told she would be shocked, though she knew she would be.
At that moment there was a sound of "git back" and "woa" beyond the hedge. The next minute two horses stepped into the Glotten just by the bend.
That must be Handshut, said Rose.
It was. He came knee-deep into the water with the horses, and, not seeing the women, plunged his head into the cool reed-sweetened stickle.
Take care—he'll see us!—and Caro sharply gathered up her legs under her blue and red striped petticoat. Rose continued to dabble hers in the water, even after Handshut had lifted his head and looked in her direction.
Rose! cried Caro.
Well, why shouldn't he see my legs? They're unaccountable nice ones.
All the more reason——
Not at all, Miss Prude.
Caro went crimson to the roots of her hair, and began pulling on her stockings. Rose continued to splash her feet in the water, glancing sidelong at Handshut.
He's a nice lad, ain't he?
Caro vouchsafed no reply.
Reuben knows he's a nice lad, and he knows I know he's a nice lad. Hasn't he got a lovely brown skin?
Hush.
But Rose was in a devilish mood.
Look here, she said suddenly, "I'm going to prove the truth of what I told you just now. I'm going to make that boy kiss me."
Indeed you ?un't.
Yes I am. I'll go down and talk to him at the bend, and you can creep along and watch us through the hedge; and I'll shut my eyes and maybe part my lips, and he'll kiss me, you see if he don't.
I won't see anything of the kind. I'm ashamed of you.
Nonsense—it's only fun—we'll make a bet on it. If I fail, I'll give you my new white petticoat with the lace edging. And I'll allow myself ten minutes to do it in; that's quite fair, for it usually takes me longer.
And what am I to give you if you succeed?
Nothing—the kiss'll be enough for me. I've been wanting to know what he was like to kiss for many a long day.
Well, I'm justabout ashamed of you, and I w?an't have anything to do with it.
You can keep out then.
Wot if I tell f?ather?
You wouldn't tell him—you wouldn't be such a sneak. After all, what's a man for, if it isn't to have a bit of fun with? I don't mean anything serious—it's just a joke.
What'll Handshut think it?
Just a joke too. You're so glum, Caro—you take everything so seriously. There's nothing really serious in a kiss.
Oh, ?un't there!
No—it's just something one enjoys, same as cakes and bull's-eyes. I've kissed dozens of people in my time and meant nothing by it, nor they either. It's because you've no experience of these things that you think such a lot of 'em. They're quite unimportant really, and it's silly to make a fuss.
For some obscure reason Caro did not like to see herself credited with the harshness of inexperience. She did her best to assume an air of worldly toleration.
Well, of course if it's only fun.... But f?ather wudn't think it that.
No, and I shouldn't like him to. You are funny, Caro. Don't watch me if you're shocked—you can know nothing about it, and then you won't be to blame. But I'm going to have my lark in spite of you.
Put on your stockings first, said Caro sternly.
Rose made a face at her, but pulled on a pair of gauzy stockings, securing them with garters of pale blue ribbon. Then she scrambled to her feet and edged her way through the reeds and bushes to where young Handshut stood at the bend.
He was not visible from where Caro sat, for he had come out of the water, and for a minute or two she vowed that she would have nothing to do with Rose's disgraceful spree. But after a time her curiosity got the better of her. Would Rose be able to do as she said—persuade her husband's drover to kiss her, simply by looking at him through half-closed eyes? Of course Handshut was very forward, Caro told herself, she had often disliked his attitude towards his mistress—he would not want much encouragement. All the same she wanted to see if Rose succeeded, and if she succeeded—how. She craned her neck, but could see nothing till she had crept a few yards through the reeds. Then she saw Rose and Handshut sitting just beyond the hedge, by the water's rim.
The horses were drowsing in the stream, flicking at the flies with their tails. Rose's dress made a brave blue splash against the green, and the gold-flecked chestnut of her hair was very close to Handshut's brown curls. Caro could dimly hear their voices, though she could not distinguish what they said. Five minutes had passed, and still, though close, there was a decent space between them. Then there was a little lull in the flow of talk. They were looking at each other. Caro crept nearer, something like a hot cinder in her heart.
They were still looking at each other. Then Handshut began to speak in a lower voice than usual; he stopped—and suddenly their heads stooped together, the gold and the brown touched, mingled, lingered, then drew slowly apart.
Caro sprang to her feet. The couple in the field had risen too, but they did not see her through the hedge. Her heart beat fiercely with an uncontrollable anger. She could have shouted, screamed at them—at her rather, this gay, comfortable, plump, spoilt wife, who had so many kisses that she could look upon one more or less as fun.
Rose's merry, rather strident laugh rang out on the hushed noon. Handshut stood facing her with his head held down; then she turned away from him and laughed again. Her laugh rose, fluttered—then suddenly broke.
It snapped like a broken knife. She turned back towards Handshut, and they faced each other once more. Then Caro saw a strange and rather terrible thing. She saw those two who had kissed for fun stumble together in an embrace which was not for fun at all, and kiss with kisses that were closer to tears than laughter.