Joseph Backfield was buried four days later. His body was carried to the church in a hay-waggon, drawn by the meek horses which had drawn his plough. Beside it walked Blackman, the only farm-hand at Odiam, in a clean smock, with a black ribbon tied to his hat. Five men from other farms acted with him as bearersthey were volunteers, for old Joseph had been popular in the neighbourhood, dealing sharply with no man."That's why I want to hear wot it's about. You read it."
"I reckon," said Reuben, "as how they'd all have been better off if they'd stayed at home."A glassy yellow broke into the sky like a curse. It shone on Reuben's eyes, and he opened them. They were pink and puffed round the rims, and the whites were shot with little blood-vessels. His cheeks were yellow, and round his mouth was an odd greyish tinge. He had lain dressed on his bed, and was surprised to find that he had slept. But the sleep had brought no refreshmentthere was a bad taste in his mouth, and his tongue felt rough and thick.Father John entered the chapel, and prostrating himself thrice at the door, arose, and silently advanced to the foot of the altar. Here he recognised the archbishop, and, checking his emotions, knelt in prayer, unnoticed till the service had concluded. In the midst of the sacred song, terror was depicted, more strongly than piety, in the faces of all the worshippers, save Sudbury; he seemed calm, except, indeed, when a shout from without caused an indignant frown to darken his brow.They could not help wondering at his strenuousness, his unlimited capacity for work, though they failed to understand or sympathise with the object that inspired them. Blackman, grumbling and perplexed, had gone off early in March to the milder energies of Raisins Farm; Becky, for want of a place, had married the drover at Kitchenhourand it was no empty boast of[Pg 34] Reuben's that he would take the greater part of their work on his own shoulders. From half-past four in the morning till nine at night he laboured almost without rest. He drove the cows to pasture, milked them, and stalled themhe followed the plough over the spring-sown crops, he groomed and watered the horses, he fed the fowls, watched the clutches, fattened capons for markethe cleaned the pigsty, and even built a new one in a couple of strenuous dayshe bent his back over his spade among the roots, over his barrow, wheeling loads of manurehe was like a man who has been starved and at last finds a square meal before him. He had all the true workman's rewardsthe heart-easing ache of tired muscles, the good bath of sweat in the sun's heat, the delicious sprawl, every sinew limp and throbbing, in his bed at nightsand then sleep, dreamless, healing, making new.The thought of Tilly did not check the young man in this beggar-my-neighbour, for he knew that her father's ambition meant her slavery. So when Reuben added a prize Jersey heifer to his stock, Realf bought a Newlands champion milker, and when Reuben launched desperately on a hay-rope twister, Realf ran him up with a wurzel-cutter. Finally Reuben bought twenty acres, of Boarzell, in which Realf did not attempt to rival him, for he already had forty which he did not know what to do with. Reuben's strugglings with Boarzell struck him as pathetic rather than splendid, an aberration of ambition which would finally spoil the main scheme.
