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And about three o'clock she was at Upthorne Farm. She and Greatorex had found a moment after morning service to arrange the hour. And now they were standing together in the doorway of the Farmhouse. In the house behind them, in the mistal and the orchard, in the long marshes of the uplands and on the brooding hills there was stillness and solitude. Maggie had gone up to her aunt at Bar Hill.
But when t' gran'father's clock strake fower he said I mun away to my bed. He'd tak a turn round t' croft, an' then he'd set off wi' his budget to t' mistal to milk t' cows. But I didn't want to gan to bed. I'd bin sleepin' off an' on all t' neet, an' I weren't feelin' a lile bit tired. So when my father had set off I went to t' door an' looked out. My song! but 'twere a grand neet.
It's it's so horribly lonely." He couldn't deny it. "A'y; it's rackoned t' bae loanly. But I sall navver leaave yo. I'm goain' t' buy a new trap for yo, soa's yo can coom with mae and Daaisy. Would yo like thot, Ally?" "Yes, Jim, I'd love it. But " "It'll not bae soa baad. Whan I'm out in t' mistal and in t' fields and thot, yo'll have Maaggie with yo." She whispered. "Jim I can't bear Maggie.
There's something there." "Ay;" he assented. "There med bae soomthing. Sall we goa oop t' fealds?" The Three Fields looked over the back of Upthorne Farm. Naked and gray, the great stone barn looked over the Three Fields. A narrow track led to it, through the gaps, slantwise, from the gate of the mistal. Above the fields the barren, ruined hillside ended and the moor began.
She had not drunk a drop and he knew it, but she clutched her bottle with a febrile obstinacy. He had to loosen her little fingers one by one. He poured the liquid into the stable gutter and flung the bottle on to the dung heap in the mistal. "What were you doing wi' thot stoof?" he said. "I don't know. I was thinking of Papa." After that he never left her until Rowcliffe came.
And then Jim Greatorex, though unseen, had burst out at them with his big voice. It came booming from the mistal at the back. Alice told the truth when she said she had never heard anything like it; and even in the dale, so critical of strangers, it was admitted that she knew. The village had a new schoolmaster who was no musician, and hopeless with the choir.
Well, one day i' lambing-time, he were warr nor he'd iver been afore; he knew that I were thrang wi' all maks o' wark, but nowt that I could do for him were reet. So at last, when I'd fmished my milking i' the mistal, I got him to bed, and then I sat misen down by the fire and had a reet good roar. I were tired to death, and wished that I'd niver been born.
It gave her the same subtle and mysterious joy that she had had on the night she and Rowcliffe walked together and saw the thorn-trees on Greffington Edge white under the hidden moon. The gray Farm-house was changed, for Jim Greatorex had got on. He had built himself another granary on the north side of the mistal. He built it long and low, of hewn stone, with a corrugated iron roof.
"I wouldn', look yo, nat ef I wuss yo, Miss Olice. I wouldn' gaw to 'im in t' mistal all amoong t' doong. Yo'll sha-ame 'im, and yo'll do nowt wi' Jimmy ef 'e's sha-amed." "Leave it, Ally. We can come another day," said Gwenda. "Thot's it," said Mrs. Gale. "Coom another daay." And as they turned away Jim's voice thundered after them from his stronghold in the mistal.
"Damn him, you can hear his beastly voice all over the place." "Ef yore yoong mon's dead set to larn fa-armin', an' ef 'e've got a head on 'is shoulders our Jem can larn 'en. Ef 'e 'aven't, ah tall yo stra-aight, Mr. Ollyveer, ye med joost's well tak yore mooney and trow it in t' mistal." Roddy laughed. "I could have told them that," he said. "Money?" "Rather.
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