So after their supper they used to sit in the pleasant lamplight very quietly, near together and yet scarcely speaking to each other, feeling the restful joy of a companionship that had passed into that deeper zone where silence can be more eloquent than words.  He was reading political economy for the purpose of opening his mind, “extending the scope of one’s int’lect,” as he said himself, and she watched him as he frowned at the page or puckered up his lips with a characteristic doggedly questioning doubtfulness.  Certainly no words were needed then to enable her to interpret his thought.  “Look here, my lad”—­that was how he was mentally addressing a famous author—­“I’m ready to go with you a fair distance; but I don’t allow you to take me an inch further than my reasoning faculty tells me you are on the right road.”  When he frowned like this, she smiled and felt much tenderness.  He would always be the same obstinate old dear:  ready to set himself against the whole weight of immemorial authority, whether in literature or everyday life.

She did not read, but with a large work-basket on a chair by her knees continued busily sewing until bedtime.  And the tenderness that she felt as she stitched and stitched was overwhelmingly more than she could feel even for Will.  When her work itself made her smile, all the intellectual expression seemed to go out of her face, and it really expressed nothing but a blankly unthinking ecstasy, whereas her smile at her husband just now had shown shrewd understanding, as well as immense kindness.  In fact, at such moments, only the outer case of Mavis Dale remained in the snug little room, while the inward best part of her had gone on a very long journey.  She could not now see the man with his book, or the walls of the room; the lamp had begun to shine with ineffable radiance; and she was temporarily a sewing-woman in paradise, stitching the ornamental flounces for dreams of glory.

Her baby, a girl, was born at the end of June, exactly three-quarters of a year from the beginning of their new existence.  The mother had what is called a bad time, and was slow to recover strength.  Nevertheless, she was able to suckle the infant, who did well from its birth and throve rapidly.

It was during the convalescent stage, one evening when he had come up to sit by her bedside, that Dale told her they had at last turned the corner.

“Yes,” he said, “orders are dropping in nicely.  We’re getting back all the good customers that slipped away from me, and some bettermost ones—­such as the Hunt stables—­that Mr. Bates himself had lost.  You may take it as something to rely on that we’re fairly round the corner of our long lane.”

Then, holding her hand and softly patting it, he praised her for the way in which she had helped him.  “You’ve been better than your word, Mav; you’ve supported me something grand.”