She looked round on Ansdore almost distrustfully ... was it true that she loved it too much?  The farm looked very lonely and bare, with the mist hanging in the doorways, and the rain hissing into the midden, while the bush—­as the trees were called which sheltered nearly every marsh dwelling—­sighed and tossed above the barn-roofs.  She suddenly realized that she did not love it as much as she used.

The knowledge came like a slap.  She suddenly knew that for the last four months her love for Martin had been eating into her love for Ansdore....  It was like the sun shining on a fire and putting it out—­now that the sun had gone she saw that her hearth was cold.  It was for Martin she had sown her spring wheat, for Martin she had broken up twelve acres of pasture by the Kent Ditch, for Martin she would shear her sheep and cut her hay....

Then since it was all for Martin, what an owl she was to sacrifice him to it, to put it before his wants and needs.  He wanted her, he needed her, and she was offering him bales of wool and cocks of hay.  Of course in this matter she was right and he was wrong—­it would be much better to wait just a week or two till after the shearing and the hay-making—­but for the first time Joanna saw that even right could surrender.  Even though she was right, she could give way to him, bend her will to his.  After all, nothing really mattered except his love, his good favour—­better that she should muddle her shearing and her crops than the first significant weeks of their married life.  He should put his dear foot upon her neck—­for the last of her pride was gone in that discovery of the dripping day, the discovery that her plans, her ambitions, her life, herself, had their worth only in the knowledge that they belonged to him.

It was on Thursday afternoon that Joanna finally beat Ansdore out of her love.  She cried a little, for she wished that it had happened earlier, before Martin went away.  Still, it was his going that had shown her at last clearly where she belonged.  She thought of writing and telling him of her surrender, but like most of her kind she shrank from writing letters except when direly necessary; and she would see Martin to-morrow—­he had promised to come to Ansdore straight from the station.

So instead of writing her letter, she went and washed the tears off her face over the sink and sat down to a cup of tea and a piece of bread and dripping with Mrs. Tolhurst and Milly Pump.  When Ellen was at home Joanna was lofty and exclusive, and had her meals in the dining-room—­she did not think it right that her little sister, with all her new accomplishments and elegancies, should lead the common, kitchen life—­also, of course, when Martin came they sat down in state, with pink wine-glasses beside their tumblers.  But when she was alone she much preferred a friendly meal with Milly and Mrs. Tolhurst—­she even joined them in pouring her tea into her saucer, and sat with it cooling on her spread fingers, her elbow on the cloth.  She unbent from mistress to fellow-worker, and they talked the scandal of a dozen farms.