After a brief interval filled with slight sounds, Bet appears in the neat-house doorway; she peeps before her until she sees the two women in the hay.
Bet, in a low eager tone.
Ursel, Ursel....
Ursel rises and goes toward her.
The cow has died ... in the dark....
When I returned but now by the yard door
I missed the boust and groped into her stall—
And did not know until I heaved and spread
Up a flat softness that went sick beneath me
With long stiff shakings, while her unearned wind
Broke far within, then slid against my cheek ...
I could have borne it if she had been cold;
But she was nearly cold, so that I felt
A thread-thin warmth I could not stay nor make ...
Nan, approaching Bet swiftly from behind and
grasping her shoulder.
Is the cow dead?
Bet, shrinking from her touch.
Nannie, the cow is dead.
Nan.
I milked her last of all, and now my fetch
Has milked her too; will ... it ... take all from me
I own through love?
(To Bet.) Why did you shrink from me?
Bet.
I did not shrink from you; what need is there?
Nan holds out her arms to her; again she draws away from Nan.
Nannie, I cannot help it ... I cannot help it....
There 's more than this world in you, and I know not
What you might do to me past your own will:
You have seen your fetch and are not one of us,
For we know not your being's dim half-conditions ...
And maybe if you touch ought that has life
You make it that your fetch can take it too—
So died the heifer.... Or maybe your least touch
Draws life from others to win you a few hours;
Or you are of the dead, and call folk to them
Through sympathy of the senses' understanding....
Poor Nannie ... O, poor Nannie ... O, poor Nannie....
She sobs loudly, stooping to wipe her eyes with her petticoat-hem.
Ursel, while seeking to still her.
Let us turn home to bed: we shall not sleep;
But once we're stripped we can relax our bodies,
Lying past thought for misery till insight
Returns again and brings us the proportion
Of all ... and us....
Nan. I shall bide here till dawn
To see if ... I return and go out ... out....
(To Bet.)
Have you left Lib and Maudlin hiding somewhere;
Or do they home by now?
Bet, overcoming her tears gradually.
We fled from here
When ... when ... and reached the neat-yard ere we knew;
We climbed the knoll and passed behind the barn;
Then through the corn land, dew-wet to our hearts,
We beat the thick rye down that choked our feet
Amid its shaggy sighing stilly weight,
Until the cottages at Damson-Closes
Hung o'er us like a dark broody-winged hen
We shunned the watcher's light where the old woman
Waits for her death, and dripped into the lane
Soft as cast shadows.... Ever all feared to speak:
Yet I went with the others through lost fields,
Straining to see the thing we prayed to miss,
Because I knew I dared not near the homestead;
Until I felt that neither should I dare
A more remote returning by myself—
When, loitering unnoticed by those trances,
I sought even you rather than be alone.
Nan, rigidly, her head having been long averted to the barn's doorway.
I hear my feet.
Ursel, in alarm. Nan, do not go....
Nan. I must.
Bet, wildly.
Again.... Wherever shall I go alone?...
She tugs her cap-strings loose and her cap over her eyes; she breathes so deeply that her trembling is heard by her breath as she fumbles her way into the mistal. The quiet steps are heard again; as Nan approaches the threshold the woman reappears to the right and passes down the lane to the left, always holding out her arms to Nan, whose arms hang tensely at her sides while her fingers twitch at her petticoat as she holds back and back from meeting the embrace. Ursel tries to go to Nan, but she cannot trail her feet after her nor draw down her hands that cover her face.
Nan.
How have I parted?... Where am I in deed?...
What of me is unseen?... Go....
The woman having disappeared to the left, still opening her arms to Nan, Nan turns and totters to the door's edge on that side; thence she feels her way supportedly along the door, but when she comes to its end she slides to her knees; after moving a little farther so, she sinks forward on her face and crawls blindly toward Ursel's feet. At the fall Ursel's hands drop; she reaches to Nan, kneels by her, feels her heart and hands, holds her own hand before Nan's mouth and nostrils; then with one swift movement she loosens her own raiment nearly to her waist, and, lying against Nan, clasps her in her arms and gathers her into her bosom.
Ursel. Nan.... O, Nan....