“No, thanks very much, I mustn’t stay. It’ll take Henry quite two hours to get to Brighton.”
She did not seem to hear him—she was listening. He could hear nothing, but a moment later a footstep sounded in the yard.
“There he is,” said Jenny.
She went out into the passage and closed the door behind her.
He was left alone in the big kitchen. The fire and the kettle hummed together to the ticking of the clock, and there was a soft, sweet smell of baking cakes. The last of the sunshine was spilling through the window on to the scrubbed, deal table, and over all the scene hung an impalpable atmosphere of comfort, warmth and peace. Outside in the passage he could hear the murmuring of a man’s and a woman’s voices.... His eyes suddenly filled with tears.
They were gone when Jenny came back into the room with Ben, who had evidently been told the reason for his brother-in-law’s visit, for he shook hands in clumsy silence.
“How do you do?” said Gervase—“and goodbye.”
Ben still said nothing. He neither approved nor understood young Alard’s ways. Religion was for him the ten commandments, Parson’s tithes, and harvest thanksgivings—anything further smacked of Chapel and the piety of small-holders. But he was too fond of Gervase to say openly what was in his heart, and as he was not used to saying anything else, he was driven into an awkward but well-meaning silence.
“I’m glad you’re taking Henry with you,” said Jenny, attempting lightness—“It would have been dreadful if you’d had to leave him behind.”
“Yes—‘The Arab’s Farewell to His Steed’ wouldn’t have been in it. But I’m taking him as my dowry. They’ll find some use for him at Thunders—he’s got at least one cylinder working. If they hadn’t wanted him I’d have given him to Ben—just to encourage him to start machinery on the farm.”