‘I’ve watched him,’ returned Rosalie, positively, ‘and I think he’s quite fit for it. He has worked under Job for some time, and is a capital milker. I think he will manage very well. As to Abel, I shall put no one in his place, for I mean to sell the pigs.’
‘Sell the pigs!’ ejaculated Isaac—‘at this time o’ year?’ His face became absolutely tragic, but Rosalie merely nodded.
‘Why, what’s to become o’ your skim-milk,’ he gasped, ‘an’ the whey, and that?’
‘There will be no skim-milk,’ said Rosalie. ‘I shall make Blue Vinney cheese, as I used to make when I was with my grandfather. Some people are very fond of it. That is made entirely of skim-milk, you know. As for the whey, there will not be much nourishment in it, but I shall keep a few sows still, just to consume that and the butter-milk. They will not require much attention as they walk about here, you see, and there is always a lot of waste green stuff.’
‘I don’t think ye’ll find many folks here what cares for the Blue Vinney cheese,’ said Isaac, still much dejected. ‘Nay, ’t is all the Ha’-skim as they likes hereabouts. The Blue Vinney has gone out o’ fashion, so to speak.’
‘If they don’t buy them here I can send them to Dorchester,’ said the widow resolutely. ‘They used to buy them up there faster than I could make them. So you see there will be no waste, Mr. Sharpe; there will be less work to do outside, and therefore I shall not miss Job or Abel; but, as we shall be very busy in the dairy, I must have two or three extra women to help me.’
Isaac stared at her ruefully; she looked brighter than she had done since her husband’s death, but she also looked determined. He shook his head slowly; his mind was of the strictly conservative order, and the contemplated abolition of pigs from the premises of this large dairy-farm seemed to him an almost sacrilegious innovation. Moreover, to sell pigs in July; to make cheeses that nobody in that part of the world cared to eat; to replace two seasoned men who knew their business—whatever might be their faults—with that dangerous commodity, womankind—the whole experiment seemed to him utterly wild, and pregnant with disaster.
‘I mean to do it,’ said Rosalie, defying the condemnation in his face. ‘By this time next year you will congratulate me on my success.’
‘I hope so, I am sure,’ said Isaac in a slightly offended tone. ‘I came here to advise ’ee, but it seems ye don’t want no advice.’
‘Oh yes, I do,’ she cried, softening in a moment. ‘I value it of all things, Mr. Sharpe. My one comfort in my difficulties is the thought that I can talk them over with you. I have laid my plan before you quite simply, in the hope that you would approve.’