"Did you really love me then?"
"Ay—I looved yo than."
She pondered it.
"Jim—what would you have done if I hadn't loved you?"
He choked back something in his throat before he answered her. "What sud I have doon? I sud have goan on looving yo joost the saame.
"We'll goa oopstairs now."
He took her back and out through the kitchen and up the stone stairs that turned sharply in their narrow place in the wall. He opened the door at the head of the landing.
"This would bae our room. 'Tis t' best."
He took her into the room where John Greatorex had died. It was the
marriage chamber, the birth-chamber, and the death-chamber of all the
Greatorexes. The low ceiling still bulged above the big double bed
John Greatorex had died in.
The room was tidy and spotlessly clean. The walls had been whitewashed. Fresh dimity curtains hung at the window. The bed was made, a clean white counterpane was spread on it.