She eyed him, sensible of an ever-increasing aversion to questions. Was he thinking of punishment hereafter, of Hell's fires?
"I bain't afeard o' Hell, and I bain't going to Heaven. For why? Heaven and Hell be here on earth—and nowheres else."
"Susan——!"
"Ay, you be mazed, and no wonder. But I be come to that. I believed in God A'mighty; I believed in Satan—for sixty long years. But such belief be clean gone."
"You be wrong, Susan. It ain't in me to argufy wi' 'ee, and, maybe, tear both our hearts. But you be wrong. The swallers knows better'n that. Who gave 'em their wisdom? I says no more but this: God sent His Own People into the wilderness, where you be, and He brought 'em out."
She shook her head. Uncle stood up.
"'Tis rainin' crool hard, but I be off to the Forest. You won't want Jane fussin' about 'ee? No. Or anybody else. I allers allowed as misery loved company, but I be so miserable this day that I wants to be alone, as you does."
He kissed her cold cheeks and went out into the rain.
She sat on for a minute, but the thought that worried her most was the regret that he had not had his tea. The day was failing fast. In a moment she would have to light a lamp and carry it upstairs. But something remained to be done, a duty neglected since the morning.
She went into the parlour, where the light was better, but not good; good enough, she reflected, for her purpose. She lifted the Bible, placed it upon the middle table, and opened it at the fly-leaf. Then she took pen and ink from her desk and a clean sheet of blotting-paper. She took out her spectacles, wiped them carefully, put them on, and sat down. Against Alfred's name she made the necessary entry, "Killed in Action," adding the date. Her hand never trembled; the writing was characteristic; firm, bold, with the words neatly spaced, indicating love of order. What she had willed herself to be, she was: a flint embedded in sterile soil. She took off her spectacles and placed them in their case, rising as she did so. Upon second thoughts, she decided to let the ink dry upon the page. Suddenly, an irresistible impulse gripped her. She glanced about her furtively, defiantly, as if challenging unseen powers to thwart her determination. Hastily with fingers that trembled this time, she snatched up the pen, dipped it into the ink, and wrote against her name, Susan Yellam, these words: