she
felt like a woman drowning; she was ready to take hold of the first
hand reached to her without knowing much about whose hand it was.
Well, she's had time to find out. She isn't drawn. Perhaps she feels
toward me somewhat as I did toward Mrs. Mumpson, and she can't help
herself either. Well, well, the bare thought of it makes my heart
lead. What's a man to do? What can I do but live up to my agreement
and not torment her any more than I can help with my company? That's
the only honest course. Perhaps she'll get more used to me in time.
She might get sick, and then I'd be so kind and watchful that she'd
think the old fellow wasn't so bad, after all, But I shan't give her
the comfort of no end of self-sacrifice in trying to be pleasant and
sociable. If she's foolish enough to think she's in my debt she can't
pay it in that way. No, sir! I've got to make the most of it now--I'm
bound to--but this business marriage will never suit me until the white
arm I saw in the dairy room is around my neck, and she looks in my eyes
and says, 'James, I guess I'm ready for a longer marriage ceremony.'"

It was a pity that Alida could not have been among the hazelnut bushes
near and heard him.

He resumed his toil, working late and doggedly. At supper he was very
attentive to Alida, but taciturn and preoccupied; and when the meal was
over he lighted his pipe and strolled out into the moonlight. She
longed to follow him, yet felt it to be more impossible than if she
were chained to the floor.

And so the days passed; Holcroft striving with the whole force of his
will to appear absorbed in the farm, and she, with equal effort, to
seem occupied and contented with her household and dairy duties. They
did everything for each other that they could, and yet each thought
that the other was acting from a sense of obligation, and so all the
more sedulously veiled their actual thoughts and feelings from each
other. Or course, such mistaken effort only led to a more complete
misunderstanding.

With people of their simplicity and habit of reticence, little of what
was in their hearts appeared on the surface. Neither had time to mope,
and their mutual duties were in a large measure a support and refuge.
Of these they could still speak freely for they pertained to business.
Alida's devotion to her work was unfeigned for it seemed now her only
avenue of approach to her husband. She watched over the many broods of
little chickens