Reuben was very kind to Naomi during her illness. He helped his mother to nurse her, and spent by her side all the time he could spare from the farm. He was too strong to vent on her personally the rage and disappointment with which circumstances had filled him. He pitied her fragility, he even pitied her for the antagonism which he saw she still felt towards him.
"Aye, Master," said another, "he is laid up but I fear he has forgot the shrieving. However, he will never again say guilty or not guilty in a jury-box, or kiss the book in justification of bail!""I've been to a wedding," he said conversationally; "a proper wedding with girls and kisses."
ONE:He stood swaying before her on his heels, his hands in his trouser-pockets, his head a little on one side. Caro did not speakshe could not.
TWO:'Tis that he may gain some more hundreds this way in,The price was now agreed upon, and the purse that accompanied the pursuivant's dress was more than sufficient to satisfy the exorbitant demand of the foreman.
TWO:He was glad from the bottom of his heart that he had not been wooed from his ambition, in a moment of weakness, by softer dreams which he now looked upon as so much dust.
THREE:His return had been complete. All that she had ever had and lost of empire had re-established itself during that hour at Cheat Land. He wanted her as he had wanted her before he met Rose, but with a renewed intensity, for he was no longer mystified by his desire. He no longer asked himself how he could possibly love "a liddle stick of a woman like her," for he saw how utterly love-worthy she was and had always been. For the first time he saw as his, if only he would take it, a great woman's faithful love. This love of Alice Jury's had nothing akin to Naomi's poor little fluttering passion, or to Rose's fascination, half appetite, half[Pg 327] game. Someone loved him truly, strongly, purely, deeply, with a fire that could be extinguished only by death orhe realised in a dim wayher own will. The question was, should he pay the price this love demanded, take it to himself at the cost of the ambitions that had fed his life for forty years?
