"It's always the farm wud you, Reuben. You might sometimes think of your own kin."
"I tell you Harry wöan't mind—he'll like it. It'll be something to occupy him. Besides, hem it all, mother! you can't expect me to kip him idling here, wud the farm scarce started yet, and nearly the whole of Boarzell still to buy."
But it was useless to expect either Mrs. Backfield or Naomi to appreciate the momentousness of his task. Were women always, he wondered, without ambition? However, though they did not sympathise, they would not oppose him—Naomi because she was not skilful at opposition, his mother because he was gradually taking the place of Harry in her heart.
He had more trouble when a day or so later he asked Naomi to inspect Harry's musical equipment.
"You see, I döan't know one tune from another, so I can't do it myself. You might git him to play one or two things over to you, Naomi, and find out what he remembers."
"I'd rather not," said Naomi, shuddering.
"Why?"
"Oh—I just can't."
"But why?"
She could not tell him. If he did not understand how every note from Harry's violin would jab and tear the tortured memories she was trying to put to sleep—if he did not understand that of himself, she would never be able to explain it to him.