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ONE:"You don't understand me," said Alice��"you can't."

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ONE:Reuben's lip curled. He could not help despising his father for this ambitionless content.

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ONE:When the actual feeding was over there were speeches[Pg 75] and toasts. Vennal of Burntbarns proposed the health of the bride, and Realf of Grandturzel that of the groom. Then Mrs. Backfield's health was drunk, then Mr. Gasson's. There were more toasts, and some songs��"Oh, no, I never mention her," "The Sussex Whistling Song," and old farmhouse ballads, such as:She could not take much interest in Reuben's ambitions, indeed she only partly understood them. What did he want Boarzell for?��it was so rough and dreary, she was sure nothing would grow there. She loved the farm, with the dear faces of the cows, and the horses, and the poultry, and even the pigs, but talk of crops and acres only bored her. Sometimes Reuben's enthusiasm would spill over, and sitting by the fire with her in the evening, he would enlarge on all he was going to do with Boarzell��this year, next year, ten years hence. Then she would nestle close to him, and murmur��"Yes, dear" ... "yes, dear" ... "that will be glorious"��while all the time she was thinking of his long lashes, his strong brown neck, the clear weight of his arm on her shoulder, and the kiss that would be hers when he took his pipe out of his mouth.

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ONE:He had a man to help him on the farm, Beatup, an uncouth coltish lad, with an unlimited capacity for work. Reuben never let him touch the new ground, but kept him busy in barn and yard with the cattle. Mrs. Backfield worked in the house as usual, and she now also had charge of the poultry; for Reuben having given them up to her when he was single-handed, had not taken them back��he had to look after Beatup, who wanted more watching than Harry, and he also had bought two more pigs as money-makers. He was saving, stinting, scraping to buy more land.Pete lay and listened shuddering, waiting with sick desire for the kindling of the dawn and the whiteness that moved among the trees. At last they came, the sky bloomed, and the orchard flickered against it, stirred by a soundless wind. The poor fellow sat up in bed, all troubled and muddled by things that had never touched him before. He stretched himself and yawned from force of habit, for he was not in the least sleepy, then he began to dress.