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'But don't you mind him. He's only amusin' himself. Your pore dear auntie used to give 'im 'is usual 'tisn't the whisky you drink an' send 'im about 'is business. 'I see. Now, is a pig-pound the same thing as a pig-sty? Rhoda nodded. ''E needs one, too, but 'e ain't entitled to it.
'It's too like cheating a sucking child, isn't it, Mr. Sidney? 'You've got me! was all the reply. 'I be used to bein' put upon, but you've got me, Mus' Midmore. Midmore pointed to a new brick pig-pound built in strict disregard of the terms of the life-tenant's lease. The gesture told the tale to the few who did not know, and they shouted.
'Very good, she snorted, 'but that cuts both ways. An' now, you go down to Sidney's this evenin' and put him where he ought to be. He was in his right about you givin' 'im notice about changin' the pig, but he 'adn't any right to turn it up before your company. No manners, no pig-pound. He'll understand. Midmore did his best to make him.
'But you asked' Midmore felt his voice jump up 'to have the pig-pound built. ''Spose I did. That's no reason you shouldn't send me notice to change the pig. 'Comin' down on me like this 'thout warnin'! That pig's got to be got into the cowshed an' all. 'Then open the door and let him run in, said Midmore. 'Don't you be'ave arbit'ry with me! Take all your dam' men 'ome off my land.
"God help me, Muster Jennings: why my wages are but eight, and my hovel scarcely better than a pig-pound." "Look you, Acton; tell Sir John what you have told me, and you are a ruined man. Make it twelve to his honour, as others shall do: who knows," he added, half-coaxing, half-soliloquizing, "perhaps his honour may really make it twelve, instead of eight."
The man went away, and served up what he had heard of the pig-pound episode as a little newspaper sketch, calculated to annoy. Midmore read it with an eye as practical as a woman's, and since most of his experiences had been among women, at once sought out a woman to whom he might tell his sorrow at the disloyalty of his own familiar friend.
Rhoda withdrew sniffing. The man looked Midmore over in silence, then jerked a thumb towards the door. 'I reckon she told you who I be, he began. 'I'm the only farmer you've got. Nothin' goes off my place 'thout it walks on its own feet. What about my pig-pound? 'Well, what about it? said Midmore. 'That's just what I be come about. The County Councils are getting more particular.
He found himself reviling the old man in speech and with a joy quite new in all his experience. He wound up it was a plagiarism from a plumber by telling Mr. Sidney that he looked like a turkey-cock, had the morals of a parish bull, and need never hope for a new pig-pound as long as he or Midmore lived. 'Very good, said the giant.
It happened to be the day when, all things and Rhoda working together, a cartload of bricks, another of sand, and some bags of lime had been despatched to build Sidney his almost daily-demanded pig-pound.
The next thing we know of him for certain is that he had been hiding in Hammond's pig-pound by the side of the road to Norton six miles, as the crow flies, from the sea. Of these experiences he was unwilling to speak: they seemed to have seared into his soul a sombre sort of wonder and indignation.
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