“Oh, my dear, my lovey, how can ’e say or think it?  You knaw what it has been to me.”

“I knaw you’ve thought all wrong ‘pon it when you’ve thought at all.  An’ Miller, tu.  You’ve prevailed wi’ me to go on livin’ a coward’s life for countless ages o’ time—­me—­me—­creepin’ on the earth wi’ my tail between my legs an’ knawin’ I never set eyes on a man as ban’t braver than myself.  An’ him—­Grimbal—­laughing, like the devil he is, to think on what my life must be!”

“I caan’t be no quicker.  The cheel’s movin’ an’ bracin’ itself up an’ makin’ ready to come in the world, ban’t it?  I’ve told ’e so fifty times.  It’s little longer to wait.”

“It’s no longer.  It’s nearer than sleep or food or drink.  It’s comin’ ’fore the moon sets.  ‘T is that or the madhouse—­nothin’ else.  If you’d felt the fire as have been eatin’ my thinking paarts o’ late days you’d knaw.  Ban’t no use your cryin’, for ’t isn’t love of me makes you.  Rivers o’ tears doan’t turn me no more.  I’m steel now—­fust time for a month—­an’ while I’m steel I’ll act like steel an’ strike like steel.  I’ve had shaky nights an’ silly nights an’ haunted nights, but my head ‘s clear for wance, an’ I’ll use it while ’tis.”

“Not to do no rash thing, Will?  For Christ’s sake, you won’t hurt yourself or any other?”

“I must meet him wance for all.”

“He ’m at the council ‘bout Jubilee wi’ faither an’ parson an’ the rest.”

“But he’ll go home arter.  An’ I’ll have ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to-night—­I will, if I’ve got to shake the word out of his sawl.  I ban’t gwaine to be driven lunatic for him or you or any.  Death’s a sight better than a soft head an’ a lifetime o’ dirt an’ drivelling an’ babbling, like the brainless beasts they feed an’ fatten in asylums.  That’s worse cruelty than any I be gwaine to suffer at human hands—­to be mewed in wan of them gashly mad-holes wi’ the rack an’ ruins o’ empty flesh grinning an’ gibbering ‘pon me from all the corners o’ the airth.  I be sane now—­sane enough to knaw I’m gwaine mad fast—­an’ I won’t suffer it another hour.  It’s come crying and howling upon my mind like a storm this night, an’ this night I’ll end it.”

“Wait at least until the morning.  See him then.”

“Go to bed, an’ doan’t goad me to more waiting, if you ever loved me.  Get to bed—­out of my sight!  I’ve had enough of ’e and of all human things this many days.  An’ that’s as near madness as I’m gwaine.  What I do, I do to-night.”

She rose from her chair in sudden anger at his strange harshness, for the wife who has never heard an unkind word resents with passionate protest the sting of the first when it falls.  Now genuine indignation inflamed Phoebe, and she spoke bitterly.

“‘Enough of me’!  Ess fay!  Like enough you have—­a poor, patient creature sweatin’ for ‘e, an’ thinkin’ for ‘e, an’ blotting her eyes with tears for ‘e, an’ bearin’ your childer an’ your troubles, tu!  ‘Enough of me.’  Ess, I’ll get gone to my bed an’ stiffen my joints wi’ kneelin’ in prayer for ‘e, an’ weary God’s ear for a fule!”