“Ess, never keep nothin’ from me, Phoebe. Theer ’s troubles that might crush wan heart as comes a light load divided between two. What message?”
“Some silly auld story ’bout a suit of grey clothes. He said I was to tell ’e the things was received by the awner.”
Will Blanchard stood still so suddenly that it seemed as though magic had turned him into stone. He stood, and his hands unclasped, and Phoebe’s church service which he carried fell with a thud into the road. His wife watched him change colour, and noted in his face an expression she had never before seen there.
“Christ A’mighty!” he whispered, with his eyes reflecting a world of sheer amazement and even terror; “he does knaw!”
“What? Knaw what, Will? For the Lard’s sake doan’t ’e look at me like that; you’ll frighten my heart into my mouth.”
“To think he knawed an’ watched an’ waited all these years! The spider patience o’ that man! I see how ’t was. He let the world have its way an’ thought to see me broken wi’out any trouble from him. Then, when I conquered, an’ got to Miller’s right hand, an’ beat the world at its awn game, he—an’ been nursing this against me! The heart of un!”
He spoke to himself aloud, gazing straight before him at nothing.
“Will, tell me what ’t is. Caan’t your awn true wife help ’e now or never?”
Recalled by her words he came to himself, picked up her book, and walked on. She spoke again and then he answered,—
“No, ’t is a coil wheer you caan’t do nought—nor nobody. The black power o’ waitin’—’t is that I never heard tell of. I thought I knawed what was in men to the core—me, thirty years of age, an’ a ripe man if ever theer was wan. But this malice! ’T is enough to make ’e believe in the devil.”