"How dare you!" The colour of Mrs. Bindle's cheeks transcended anything that Bindle had ever seen. "How dare you speak to me! How—you coarse—you—you disgusting beast!"
At the sight of Mrs. Bindle's blazing eyes and heaving chest, the farmer involuntarily retreated a step.
Several times he blinked his eyes in rapid succession.
Mr. Hearty turned and concentrated his gaze upon what the old man had described as "that there muck 'eap."
"Bindle!" cried Mrs. Bindle. "Will you stand by and let that man insult me? He's a coarse, low——" Her voice shook with suppressed passion. Mr. Hearty drew out his handkerchief and coughed into it.
For several seconds Mrs. Bindle stood glaring at the farmer, then, with a sudden movement, she turned and walked away with short, jerky steps of indignation.
Mr. Hearty continued to gaze at the muck heap, whilst the farmer watched the retreating form of Mrs. Bindle, as if she had been a double-headed calf, or a three-legged duck.
When she had disappeared from sight round the corner of the house, he once more mopped his forehead with the coloured-handkerchief, then, thrusting it into his pocket, he resumed his hat with the air of a man who has escaped from some deadly peril.
"It's all that there Jim," he muttered. "I told him to look out for the wind and move them cows; but will he? Not if he knows it, dang him."
"Don't you take it to 'eart," said Bindle cheerily. "It ain't no good to start back-chat with my missis."