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Ishmael had done him no harm, and he bore him no grudge; neither, since he was not an admirer of his elder brother Archelaus, did he take up his cause. It simply was that John-James was not made for the emotions. He knew nothing about them and they made him uncomfortable. For a long while Ishmael failed to discover this.
She herself had never seemed so fascinating and so sure; Vassie was swept away by her for the first time; Phoebe lost a certain sense of grudge in awed admiration; Judy, in speech and action, contrived to lead up to her friend, whole-heartedly exploiting the wonder of her. John-James and Killigrew were probably the only two there who did not acknowledge the sway.
I'll see what I can do with it when I'm to Mr. Tonkin, and then perhaps we'll all snap our fingers at Parson Boase." "Tom do talk a wunnerful passel o' nonsense," remarked John-James placidly as his brother picked up his boots and went out. But Tom was of the truly great who can always contain themselves when there is nothing to be gained by an explosion, and he disappeared without answering.
It was a long speech for John-James, and he paused with his countenance suffused a deep purplish hue. Ishmael seized his hand and wrung it with a sudden young gust of enthusiasm that he could not control. "You'll help. I know you will. Oh, we'll pull the old place up yet. We'll make such a thing of it...." But John-James had withdrawn his hand limply.
The two little girls he adored, and they knew he was their uncle, though with the unquestioning faith of childhood they accepted that he lived alone in a little cottage like a working man because he was eccentric and mustn't be worried to live as father did. Ishmael was very fond of this brother as fond as John-James' rigid taciturnity would let him be.
Her strong young eyes could see the darker blown mesh of their manes and the long hair about their fetlocks; she could see, too, that the man in a faded blue shirt and earth-coloured trousers driving them was John-James, for even at that distance his sturdy build and the copper red of his broad neck were unmistakable.
Neither his early experiences of farm life nor his opportunities of more scientific study had been wasted on Ishmael, and he looked over pasture and arable now with an eye knowing enough, if not quite as much so as he tried to make it appear to John-James.
She's gwain to be 'ansome, white as a lily she is, and it'll be better for she if she do have things to think of like the gentry. For if Ishmael's gentry, there's no rason Vassie shoulden be. They'm the same blood after all. An' it's dangerous blood, Mr. Boase." The Parson sat for a moment in silence while John-James shifted his feet anxiously.
T'other day he come to I and he says, 'Oh, John-James Beggoe, my dear, what shall I do? I forgot I did ought to arrange my cows all in steps, so to speak, so that they shouldn't all calve to wance, and now they'll all be a doen of it and us won't get no milk...." John-James broke off with a chuckle, then resumed with: "Seen the calves yet?" "No. I suppose they've been turned out?" "Not yet.
Wheels sounded on the cobbles of the courtyard, and the clatter of hoofs; it meant that John-James and Vassie were back, bringing her son. She got to her feet and went through the house to the yard door, already recovering a little of poise, which meant artificiality, but still with something of that real glow about her. She knew a moment of dread lest Ishmael should rebuff it.
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