rash thing, Will? For Christ's sake, you won't hurt
yourself or any other?"

"I must meet him wance for all."

"He 'm at the council 'bout Jubilee wi' faither an' parson an' the
rest."

"But he'll go home arter. An' I'll have 'Yes' or 'No' to-night--I will,
if I've got to shake the word out of his sawl. I ban't gwaine to be
driven lunatic for him or you or any. Death's a sight better than a soft
head an' a lifetime o' dirt an' drivelling an' babbling, like the
brainless beasts they feed an' fatten in asylums. That's worse cruelty
than any I be gwaine to suffer at human hands--to be mewed in wan of
them gashly mad-holes wi' the rack an' ruins o' empty flesh grinning an'
gibbering 'pon me from all the corners o' the airth. I be sane now--sane
enough to knaw I'm gwaine mad fast--an' I won't suffer it another hour.
It's come crying and howling upon my mind like a storm this night, an'
this night I'll end it."

"Wait at least until the morning. See him then."

"Go to bed, an' doan't goad me to more waiting, if you ever loved me.
Get to bed--out of my sight! I've had enough of 'e and of all human
things this many days. An' that's as near madness as I'm gwaine. What I
do, I do to-night."

She rose from her chair in sudden anger at his strange harshness, for
the wife who has never heard an unkind word resents with passionate
protest the sting of the first when it falls. Now genuine indignation
inflamed Phoebe, and she spoke bitterly.

"'Enough of me'! Ess fay! Like enough you have--a poor, patient creature
sweatin' for 'e, an' thinkin' for 'e, an' blotting her eyes with tears
for 'e, an' bearin' your childer an' your troubles, tu! 'Enough of me.'
Ess, I'll get gone to my bed an' stiffen my joints wi' kneelin' in
prayer for 'e, an' weary God's ear for a fule!"

His answer was an action, and before she had done speaking he stretched
above him and took his gun from its place on an old beam that extended
across the ceiling.

"What in God's name be that for? You wouldn't--?"

"Shoot a fox? Why not? I'm a farmer now, and I'd kill best auld red Moor
fox as ever gave a field forty minutes an' beat it. You was whinin'
'bout the chicks awnly this marnin'. I'll sit under the woodstack a bit
an' think 'fore I starts. Ban't no gude gwaine yet."

Will's explanation of his deed was the true one, but Phoebe realised in
some dim fashion that she stood within the shadow of a critical night
and that action was called upon from her.