“’It were better a millstone’—” Owen began to read to himself.
“The devil!” shouted Tom, rushing from the table and slamming the door behind him.
Owen went out after him. Their work for that day lay in the sheep-pens by the brook, washing and shearing the sheep. Before him Tom was walking very fast and talking in a loud, angry voice. But Owen was thinking of the sound of the wind as it cried and whimpered and pleaded all night long. And the flowers he saw in the grass at his feet made him think of big eyes; and the sheen on the grass, of a child’s hair; and the slender birch-wands, of a child’s little body. What would it have been like to have had such a little one a part of him? And supposing it had lain crumpled together like yonder fern—Owen’s heart gave a great leap.
Tom was still talking when he reached the sheepfold. The anger had left his face, and in its stead there was uneasy inquiry. Owen, without looking at his brother, took his seat on the shearing-stool and the shepherd carried a sheep to him. Owen turned it deftly. Clip, clip, clip, the fleece began to roll back from the shears and the skin to show pink through the stubble of remaining fleece. Clip! a deft turn to right, then to left, and the fleece slipped to the ground and lay there, white, and with arms outstretched.
“Och!” exclaimed Owen, staring at it, “I’m goin’ westward to the child, tell Jane.”
“I’m goin’, too,” called Tom, walking after him rapidly, grumbling and talking, “an’ I’ll not tell Jane. There’s no need to go so fast, whatever.”
Jane came to the door of the cottage and looked down to the roadway. Gwennie was beside her and caught sight of Owen. “Baa-a!” the lamb bleated, scampering downhill.
“Gwennie, Gwennie!” called Jane.
But the stiff little legs were taking the hillside in leaps and bounds.
“Gwennie, bach, Gwennie, Gwennie bach!”