"Yes, mother."
"Bury I wi' wots in thur, and take care o' the rest on't. Thee's want it bad enough afore th' spring comes."
Madge replaced the stocking without examining it. She was heavy at heart.
Before morning her mother was dead.
Madge went back to her own cottage, carrying with her just a sovereign in sixpences and fourpenny-bits. She sat down and wept. No one came near her. Her former gossips, always jealous of her beauty, left her alone with her sorrow. But she knew that she could not remain idle. Something must be done. So she went out to rick-work, but there was none to be had. From farm to farm Madge wearily toiled along, meeting the same answer everywhere—"Had got more on now than they could find work for." Madge felt exceedingly ill as she slowly wended her way homewards. Then for the first time she remembered that she must shortly become a mother.
In her weak state Madge caught cold. She shivered incessantly. The poor child could not rise from her bed in the morning, her limbs were so stiff and her head so bad. She lay there all day, crying to herself. Hunger at last, towards evening, compelled her to get up and seek food. There was only a piece of crust in the cupboard and a little lard. She was trying to masticate these when there came a tap at the door. "Come in," said Madge. Farmer Humphreys now appeared in the doorway. He was a short, thick man, with a shock-head of yellow hair, small grey eyes, and lips almost blue.
"There be ten weeks' rent a-owing," said he, sitting down; "and we don't mean to wait no longer. And there's a half-side o' bacon an' a load of faggots."
"How much is it altogether?"
"Seventeen-and-six."
"I ain't a-got but a pound, and Absalom bean't come whoam."