Neither Harris nor his family turned up at The Dyke that evening. Old Dan, who had kept his own counsel, was in the middle of his mole-catching song when one of the ploughman’s children came in with a message to say that her dad was in a fever, and the bed wringing wet under him.
‘Why didn’t your mother come?’ Prosser asked.
‘Dad wouldn’t let her,’ said the child.
Marion took her aside and gave her a piece of cake.
‘It never rains but it pours,’ Prosser grumbled. ‘Here’s Harris badly, and now Hayes tells me he’s got a poisoned finger. I don’t know what we’ll do for the milking to-morrow.’
‘There’s Fellows,’ said Marion.
‘Yes, it’s lucky we’ve got him. Why, he isn’t here either! What the devil’s the matter with them all?’
Marion said nothing. She had guessed long ago why Abner was not there. She had half suspected that he would not come to The Dyke without Mary, but her pride would not let her ask her father to invite the family from Wolfpits. In the bottom of her heart she doubted if she would dare to meet her old friend. It would be so difficult, and besides that she felt that the intuitions of the other woman might discover her own leaning toward Abner. It was too dangerous.
Next morning Abner arrived at his usual hour. During the night Dr Hendrie had been summoned to The Dyke and had found that the neglected splinter in the cowman’s finger threatened him with blood-poisoning, and the loss of his arm. At dawn Mr Prosser had driven him in to the infirmary at Shrewsbury. Marion received Abner on his arrival.
‘Why didn’t you come up last night?’ she said.