Fingering the broken pieces reverently, she forgot that the jar had been cracked before and only remembered it as a beautiful thing that had once been hers. The thought of possession was comfortable and satisfying. Mary's mouth curved in a soft little smile. Anderby was hers. The mortgage was paid. That was worth anything; worth unlovely dresses made in the village, worth the constant strain of economy, worth the ten year's intimacy with a man whose presence roused in her alternate irritation and disappointment.
"Nothing is wanting to make us happy except a young Robson."
Mary brushed together the crumbs from the hearth-rug and straightened her back.
Well, worth that too, perhaps.
She looked round the shadowy room—ghostly dark beyond her feeble candlelight. The smile flickered again across her face.
"May we never want nowt, nawn on us," she whispered.
Chapter III
THE KINGDOM
While Uncle Dickie was proposing his toast in the Robsons' dining-room, another party was in progress up the village in the smoke-room of the Flying Fox. The Flying Fox was a cosy little inn, not frequented by strangers like the Eden Arms. The men who now sat there, smoking and talking, were old habitués.