Habakkuk climbed on to the hub of the wheel and with Hal’s help got safely on to the straw where he lay quite still.
“Ready?” said French, and then turned the horses about without waiting for an answer, and drove out of the gate amidst the jests and farewells of the onlookers.
“You won’t forget the flannel?” Sue called after him.
French’s deep, pleasant voice rang back through the thin, cold air: “Rather would I forget the wagon, mistress.”
Sue laughed.
“There’s a new gown on the way,” she said with a sigh of satisfaction as she went back to the kitchen.
Anny gulped and Hal, turning at that moment, saw her disappointed little face in the moonlight. She looked at him so sorrowfully without speaking, and then went into the Inn.
He was about to follow her but checked himself; he began to realize a little how much she cared for pretty things and what she had given up with the sail-cloth bundle. Pushing his hands into his pockets he walked out of the gate and down the road to the sea, his chin on his breast. He had not gone very far before he met old Gilbot stumping along alone.
The old man hailed him cheerily and bade him go down to fetch little Red who, he averred, was scooning stones on the clear sea. “No one obeys me,” he concluded with a chuckle. “I can’t make the young one come. Go fetch him, Hal.”
He waddled off, smiling and talking to himself.