TWO:All the same she was bitterly disappointed when the following year another boy was born. She sobbed into her pillow, and even Reuben's delight and little Richard's soft kicks against her breast, could not comfort her. In fact she felt secretly angry with Reuben for his joy. He did not think of her and what she wanted. He thought only of his dirty old farm, and that dreary, horrible Boarzell.After a time they began to notice a convergence in these independent ways. It seemed as if only by running apart had they learned at last to run together. A certain friendliness and comradery began to establish itself between them. Reuben began to talk to Naomi[Pg 110] about politics and agricultural doings, and gradually her character underwent a strange blossoming. She became far more adult in her opinions; she took interest in matters outside her household and immediate surroundings. He never spoke to her of his plans for Boarzell, for that would have brought them back into the old antagonism and unrest; but when she read the papers to him he would discuss them with her, occasionally interrupt her with comments, and otherwise show that he had to do with an intelligent being. She in her turn would enquire into the progress of the hops or the oats, ask him if his new insect-killer was successful, or whether Ditch had done well with his harvest, or how much Realf's had fetched at the corn-market.
TWO:Holgrave had never much reason to boast of the gift of speech, more especially when his feelings were in any wise affected. Even the galleyman was not as eloquent now as upon former occasions, and the two issued forth, and walked on for about five minutes, without exchanging a word. Wells, at length, stopped at a house in the vicinity of St. Bartholomew's Priory, with a heavy, gothic, stone arch, inclosing an iron studded door, and the windows of the first, and still more the second, story projecting so as to cast a strong shadow over the casement of the ground-floor. Wells tapped twice with the hilt of his dagger at the oaken door, which was softly opened, and he and Holgrave entered.In the middle of the night he woke up feeling quite differently. A sick and guilty horror overwhelmed him. He must have been delirious the day before, light-headed with pain and misery. Now he saw clearly what he had done. He was a thief. He had committed a terrible sinbroken one of the Ten Commandments. He might be caught and put in prison, anyhow, the God who said, "Thou shalt not" would punish him and perhaps Bessie too. The sweat poured down Robert's forehead and off his cheeks. The future seemed to be closing in upon him with iron walls. He trembled, cowered, and would have said, "Our Father" if he dared. Oh God, why had he done this dreadful thing?
