“John Grimbal’s!”

Hicks stood still as though this announcement had turned him into stone.

“Ess fay!  Why do ‘e stand glazin’ like that?  A chap rode out for ’e ’pon horseback; an’ a bit o’ time be lost a’ready.  They ‘m swarmin’ in the orchard, an’ nobody knaws more ’n the dead what to be at.”

“I won’t go.  Let them get Johnson.”

“‘Won’t go’!  An’ five shillin’ hangin’ to it, an’ Lard knaws what more in time to come!  ‘Won’t go’!  An’ my poor legs throbbin’ something cruel with climbin’ for ’e!”

“I—­I’m not going there—­not to that man.  I have reason.”

“O my gude God!” burst out the old woman, “what’ll ‘e do next?  An’ me—­as worked so hard to find ‘e—­an’ so auld as I am!  Please, please, Clem, for your mother—­please.  Theer’s bin so little money in the house of late days, an’ less to come.  Doan’t, if you love me, as I knaws well you do, turn your back ‘pon the scant work as falls in best o’ times.”

The man reflected with troubled eyes, and his mother took his arm and tried to pull him down the hill.

“Is John Grimbal at home?” he asked.

“How shude I knaw?  An’ what matter if he is?  Your business is with the bees, not him.  An’ you’ve got no quarrel with him because that Blanchard have.  After what Will done against you, you needn’t be so squeamish as to make his enemies yourn.”

“My business is with the bees—­as you say, mother,” he answered slowly, repeating her words.

“Coourse ’tis!  Who knaws a half of what you knaw ’bout ’em?  That’s my awn braave Clem!  Why, there might be a mort o’ gude money for a man like you at the Red House!”

“I’ll go.  My business is with the bees.  You walk along slowly, or sit down a while and get your breath again.  I’ll hurry.”

She praised him and blessed him, crying after him as he departed,—­“You’ll find all set out for ‘e—­veil, an’ gloves, an’ a couple of bee-butts to your hand.”

The man did not reply, but soon stumbled down the steep hill and vanished; then five-and-twenty minutes later, with the implements of his trade, he stood at the gate of the Red House, entered, and hastened along the newly planted avenue.

John Grimbal had not yet gone into residence, but he dwelt at present in his home farm hard by; and from this direction he now appeared to meet the bee-keeper.  The spectacle of Grimbal, stern, grave, and older of manner than formerly, impressed Hicks not a little.  In silence, after the first salutation, they proceeded towards an adjacent orchard; and from here as they approached arose an extravagant and savage din, as though a dozen baited dogs, each with a tin kettle at his tail, were madly galloping down some stone-paved street, and hurtling one against the other as they ran.

“They can stop that row,” said Hicks. “’Tis an old-fashioned notion that it hurries swarming, but I never found it do so.”