ONE:Benjamin had given no one the faintest hint of his plans; indeed for the last two or three weeks his behaviour had been unusually good. Then one morning, when Reuben was at Robertsbridge market, he disappearedHandshut could not find him to take his place in the lambing shed. Rose was angry, for she had wanted young Handshut to hang some curtains for herone cause of disagreement between her and Reuben was her habit of coaxing the farm-hands to do odd jobs about the house.
FORE:"What! Gloucester?"The rest of that day Reuben was a little happier. He felt comforted and stimulated, life was not so leaden. In the evening he worked a little in the hop-gardens. They were almost cleared now, and the smoke of the drying furnaces was streaming through the cowls of the oasts, shedding into the dusk a drowsy, malt-sweetened perfume. When the moon hung like a yellow splinter above Iden Wood, the pickers went home, and Reuben[Pg 326] turned in to his supper, which for the first time since Rose's flight he ate with hearty pleasure.
FORE:He took off his coat again, growling, and for the first time Reuben felt shame. It was such a different matter, this, from being beaten by somebody who was angry with one and with whom one was angry. He saw now that a beating was one of the many things which are all right as long as they are hot, but damnable when they are cold. He hunched his shoulders, and felt his ears burn, and just the slightest stickiness on his forehead.
FORE:"Hurray for MacKinnon!Down with the Tollkeepers!"Reuben struck his horse with the whip, and the[Pg 185] animal sprang forward. A man who had been trying to climb into the gig, fell off, and was nearly trampled on. Reuben flogged his way through the pack, a shower of missiles hurtling round him, while his ears burned with the abuse which had once been his badge of pride, but now in the hour of defeat smote him with a sick sense of impotence and degradation. "Ben the Gorilla! Ben the Gorilla!"
FORE:"Stephen Holgrave," said the baron, in a stern voice, "are these your shafts?" as he beckoned to old Luke to hand the yeoman two arrows which he had hitherto concealed."My lord, I await your pleasure," replied the monk submissively.
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