The dog stretched herself, gave a low “yeow-ow” of protest, looked up at Yeoman Hirst to learn if he were in earnest. Seeing he was, she turned to David, and put her fore paws on his chest and licked his face.
“Nay, nay!” said he. “What sort of guest would David be, lass, if he let thee wheedle him after the master had said under?”
Fanny had liquid eyes, of a shade and lustre that any woman might have owned to the shaming of her sisters; she lifted them now to David’s, in between the patient licking of his face, with surprise that he should turn the cold shoulder to a friend in this way. So it ended—seeing the man’s heart was soft and foolish toward all dumb things—in David’s bringing a chair up to the hearth, in his taking the dog’s brown-black, wistful head into his hands and stroking her muzzle softly.
“Shame on thee, David!” laughed Hirst. “She’ll be all spoiled by to-morn, when I want her to drive up the sheep into the moor.”
“We’ll chance it, Farmer! Ay, we’ll chance it. Like to feel a dog’s head in my hands, I—seems to hearten a man.”
Now that he had met his trouble, had seen Priscilla face to face and conquered the outward signs of heartache, David was almost merry. It had been a desperate venture, this of meeting Cilla so soon; and, now that he was in the thick of it, he felt something of the glow and mad-wit gaiety which attends on great adventures.
Never had Cilla guessed till now that David Blake could be so light of talk. The sobriety, nearing dulness, which she associated with him was gone. Keen, quick lights of humour played about his face. He had stories at command—droll tales which Will the Driver had told him of the road, sly anecdotes concerning the foibles of his neighbour-folk. He was guarding a heartache bravely, was David.
Once, in the pause of talk, he looked at Cilla, and found her eyes resting on him with strange intentness. She was thinking that the helping hand-grip she had sought not long ago, when she resisted and yet longed for Gaunt’s caresses, was David’s own. And, when she saw that he had caught the glance, and was trying to read it, she took up her sewing, and hoped the colour in her cheeks would be counted to the firelight’s credit.
“Why, Cilla, I’ve a horn of ale beside me, and David here has none!” said the farmer abruptly. “Where are your manners, lass?”
“Nay, now, take no trouble,” protested David. “I’ve a pipe betwixt my teeth, Farmer, and what more should a man want?”