May. And I’m thinking as they’ll be rare pleased for to have I in the house again. ’Twill be another pair of hands to the work like. And when I was young, ’twas not on work as I was set much.
Harry. Ah, I did guess as much.
May. But when I gets a bit over this here nasty cough, ’tis a strong arm as them’ll have working for they; Steve, th’ old woman what’s his mother, and little Dorry, too.
Harry. Dorry? I han’t heard tell of she.
May. That’s my little baby as was, Harry Moss. I left she crawling on the floor, and now I count as she be growed into a rare big girl. Bless the innocent heart of her!
Harry. Whatever led you to do such a thing, I can’t think! You must have been drove to it like, wasn’t you?
May. ’Twas summat inside of me as drove I, then. ’Twas very likely the blood of they gipsies which did leap in I, so that when I was tied up to Steve, ’twas as if they had got I shut in a box. ’Twas the bridle on my head and the bit in the mouth of I; and to be held in where once I had gone free. [A short pause.
May. And I turned wild, Harry, for the very birds seemed to be calling I from the hedges to come out along of they, and the berries tossing in the wind, and the leaves blowing away quick from where they’d been stuck all summer. All of it spoke to I, and stirred I powerful, so that one morning when the sun was up and the breeze running, I comed out into the air, Harry, and shut the door behind I. And ’twas done—so ’twas.
Harry. And didn’t they never try for to stop you, nor for to bring you back, May?
May. No, Harry, they did not.