But Mavis thought all these actions rather spirited and charming than maladroit and annoying.  They proved that Rachel was trying hard to be of use, and her too rapid and abrupt gestures were a pleasing evidence that the little creature possessed a vivacious and not a sluggish disposition.  However, the crash of the album on the floor had awakened Billy, who was now crying lustily; and Rachel’s license having long since expired, Mavis decided to send both her treasures to bed.  Rachel resisted the edict, and, presently conducted up-stairs by Mary, bellowed more loudly than her brother; indeed for a little while the house was filled with the harsh sound of squalling.  Yet this noise, though distressing, was as musical as harps and lutes to the mother’s ears; and while old Mrs. Goudie in the kitchen was saying:  “They children want a smart popping to learn them on’y to squawk when there’s reason for squawking,” Mavis was thinking:  “Poor darlings, I’d go up and kiss them again, if Mary didn’t always quiet them down quicker than I can.”

Alone with her newspaper snippets, Mavis did more reading than pasting.  “Heroic Rescue at Otterford Mill”—­that was the description of how Will saved good-for-nothing Abraham Veale.  She knew it almost by heart, but she had to read it again.  “Brave Deed at Manninglea Cross Station”—­that was something that made her feel faint every time she thought of it, and she trembled now as she read in the snippet of how there had been a frightened dog on the line between the platforms, and how Will had jumped down in front of the approaching train and whisked the dog out of danger just in time.

She folded her hands, puckered her forehead, and passed into a reverie about him.  Combining with her intense admiration, there was a great horror of all this reckless courage.  He would not have been so foolhardy years ago.  It was against the principles that he had once laid down as limiting the risks that a brave man may run.  It indicated a change in him, a change that she had never pondered on till now.  She thought of him fighting the wind on top of their rick, and of several other incidents unchronicled by the press—­of his going with the police at Old Manninglea when there was the bad riot, of his joining the Crown keepers when they went out to catch the poachers, of his wild performance when Mr. Creech’s bull got loose.  Goring bulls, bludgeoning men, tempest and flood—­wherever and whatever the danger, he went straight to it.  But it was not fair to her and the babes.  His thrice precious life!  And she grew cold as she thought that an accident—­like a curtain descending when a stage play is over—­might some day end all her joy.

Then she thought once more of that dark period of their dual existence; and it was the last time that she was ever capable of thinking of it seriously and with any real concentration.  Had that trouble left any permanent mark on him?  Her own suffering had left no mark on her.  It was gone so entirely that, as well as seeming incredible, it seemed badly invented, silly, preposterous.  All that remained to her was just this one firm memory, that, strange or not, there had truly once been a time when his arms were not her shelter, and she dared not look into his face.