She went into no explanation; she did not remind him of the three
hundred acres required to round off the estate, nor did she make the
confession which she had been saving up, like a guilty child, of how she
had got round the obstinacy of Mr. Thistlethwaite. She made some quiet
reply to his last remark, and went on talking of other things. He was
perfectly oblivious to the moment that had come and gone. And she, in
her mind, was already making excuses for him; he had been away for so
long, he had grown accustomed to such vast districts where three hundred
acres must seem paltry indeed! When they had looked sufficiently at the
view, she returned down the path beside him, her hand still slipped into
the crook of his arm, without the slightest resentment. Henry! she could
never harbour resentment against Henry.
But a little of the eagerness was gone; not much; only the first edge
taken off. She struggled to restore it; she had an uneasy feeling of
disloyalty towards Henry. And really he had been so very charming;
nothing could have been more charming or more to her taste than his
manner towards her from the very first moment when he had bent to kiss
her in the porch, fond but deferential, intimate but courteous. Henry
was the sort of man who would always be courteous towards women, even
when the woman happened to be his own mother. Mrs. Martin greatly
appreciated courtesy. She often said that it was becoming rarer and more
rare. Certainly, Henry’s manner had been perfect in every respect, and
she was seized with remorse that she could have directed against him so
much as the criticism of a passing disappointment. She must not admit to
herself that the edge of her eagerness was blunted; and she began
forcing herself to talk of Lynes and the farm, and presently, because
Henry listened with so much attention and interest, she found her
eagerness creeping back. They went round to the rickyard together, where
Lynes, in his breeches and leather gaiters, was talking to the carter,
but broke off to come towards Henry, who shook hands with him while Mrs.
Martin stood by, beaming upon their meeting. She was enchanted with
Henry; he asked Lynes questions about the cattle, and followed him into
the door of the shed where the afternoon’s milking was in progress. Mrs.
Martin waited for them near the ricks, because she did not like the
dirty cobbles of the farmyard; she was perfectly happy again; this was
what she had always foreseen, and she liked things to turn out exactly
according to the picture she had been in the habit of making in advance
in her own mind; she was only disconcerted when they fell out
differently. How good was Henry’s manner with Lynes! she watched the two
men as they stood in the doorway of the cowshed; Henry had said
something and Lynes was laughing; he pushed back his cap off his
forehead and scratched his head, and she heard him say, “That’s right,
sir, that’s just about the size of it.” Her heart swelled with pride in
Henry. He was getting on with Lynes; Lynes approved of him, that was
obvious, and Lynes’ approval was not easily won. He was a scornful man,
not always very tractable either, and very contemptuous of most people’s
knowledge of agriculture; but here he was approving of Henry. Her own
esteem of Henry rose in proportion as she saw Lynes’ esteem. She felt
that a little of the credit belonged to her for being Henry’s mother.
They came towards her, walking slowly and talking, across the soft
ground of the rickyard, where the cartwheels had cut deep ruts and the
wisps of straw were sodden into the black earth. It was a great
satisfaction to her to see Henry and Lynes thus together. She was the
impresario exhibiting them to one another. The afternoon was drawing
very gently to a close. A little cold, perhaps, a little grey, but still
tender; a dove-like grey, hovering over the trees, over the ricks, and
over the barn with the yellow lichen on the roof. A tang of damp
farmyard was, not unpleasantly, on the air.
“We’ll go in now, shall we, Henry? It’s getting chilly,” said Mrs.
Martin, wrapping herself more closely in her brown cloak, and nodding
and smiling to Lynes.
As they went towards the house, Henry said, looking down at her in that
confidential way he had, “Well, that’s a great duty accomplished, isn’t
it?”
“Duty, Henry?”
“Yes. Talking to Lynes, I mean.”
“Oh! talking to Lynes. To be sure—— You were so nice to him, dear boy;
thank you.”
Duty—the word gave her a small chill. She bent over the fire in the
sitting-room, poking it into a blaze; the logs fell apart and shot up
into flame.
“I do like a wood fire,” said Mrs. Martin. She held out her hands
towards it; they were cold. She had not known, until that moment, how
cold she had been.