“I wonder you didn’t think of takin’ it on yourself.”

“I did,” confessed ’Bias imperturbably.

“You? . . .  Well, what next?”

“I thought of it. . . .  Only for a moment, though.  First place, I didn’ want to stand in your way; an’ next, as you was sayin’ just now, ’tis a ticklish matter when a man starts ’pon a business he knows nothing about.  But you’ll soon pick it up, bein’ able to give your whole time to it.”

“That might apply to you.”

To this ’Bias made no reply.  He smoked on, pressing down the tobacco in the bowl of his pipe.  The two friends sat in a constrained silence, now and again pushing the wine politely.

“When you are ready?” suggested ’Bias at length—­as Cai helped himself to a final half-glassful, measuring it out with exactitude and leaving as much or may be a trifle more at the bottom of the decanter.  “Ladies don’t like to be kept waitin’ too long.”

Cai swallowed the wine and stood up, swallowing down also an inward mirth to which his anger had given way.  During the last minute or two he had been recalling many things,—­his first meeting with Mrs Bosenna; his first call at Rilla; her remarks on that occasion, upon the grace of a cultivated manner in men; some subsequent glances, intimate almost; above all, the clutch upon his protective arm. . . .  He felt sorry for ’Bias.  Under the rosy influence of Mrs Bosenna’s wine he felt genuinely sorry for ’Bias, while enjoying the humorous aspect of ’Bias’s delusion.  ’Bias—­for whose lack of polish he had from the first made Excuse—­’Bias laying down the law on what ladies liked and disliked!

They arose heavily and strolled forth to view the livestock.  It was wonderful with what ease these two retired seamen, without instruction, dropped into the farm-master’s routine.  So (if in other words) Dinah remarked, glancing out of the mullioned window of the kitchen as she fetched a fresh faggot for the hearth on which her mistress had already begun to set out the heavy-cake and potato-cake in preparation for tea-time.

“—­the afternoon habits, I mean,” explained Dinah.  “Just glimpsy out o’ window, mistress, an’ see the pair o’ men down there—­along studyin’ the pigs.  Wouldn’ know a pig’s starn from his stem, I b’lieve, if th’ Almighty hadn’ clapped on a twiddling tail, same as they put in books to show where a question ends.  When they come to that, they’re safe. . . .  But from their backs, mistress—­do ’ee but take a look now, do—­you wouldn’ guess they weren’t just as knowledgeable as th’ old master himself, as used to judge pigs for the Royal Cornwall—­the poor old angel!  I can see him now, after the best part of a bottle o’ sherry, strollin’ out to the styes.”

“Don’t, Dinah!” entreated Mrs Bosenna, stealing a glance nevertheless:  which Dinah demurely noted.  “It’s—­it’s all so recent!”

“Ay,” agreed Dinah, and mused, standing boldly before the window, knuckles on hips.  “You couldn’ say now, takin’ ’em separate, what it is that puts me more in mind of th’ old master.”