“Ishmael!  You must come back with me now; there are things I want you to do at the vicarage.  Come.”

Ishmael recognised the tone of authority.  He was an obedient child simply because he was so proud he would not fight a losing battle.  Sooner than be conquered he obeyed as though he were doing the thing commanded merely because he himself wished to, and for the same reason if he could forestall a command by his own action he did.  He came to the Parson’s side.

“Must be going, Phoebe,” he remarked carelessly; “I’ve a heap of things to do for to-night, you see.  Morning, Mr. Lenine!”

And he set off again, with his thumbs in his belt.

CHAPTER III

THE KITCHEN

Annie Ruan and three of the children were assembled in the great kitchen preparing for the supper party that was to be held after the Neck had been cried.  The world without was still steeped in the golden light of full afternoon, but the small windows only looked on to the courtyard and let little of the gleam into the low-ceiled room; dimness veiled the corners, and through it each plate on the old dresser held a faintly glimmering crescent of light.  On a sheet of iron laid upon the open hearth the last loaves of barley-bread were baking under a crock, and Vassilissa Beggoe was preserving the leaven for next week’s breadmaking by the simple process of placing it in a saucer of water, where it would mildew in peace.

Vassilissa was the youngest of the four Beggoes,—­only three years older than Ishmael.  She was the most like Archelaus in face, and showed promise of a sleek, white and gold beauty to come; at present, being far too tall for her age, she seemed unable to manage her long legs and arms, but her movements had the graceful ungainliness of a young animal.  She was muffled in a dirty print pinafore, and above its faded blue her neck looked a delicate privet-white, and would have looked whiter still had it been cleaner.  In the dusk her little pale head, the shape of it clearly defined by the way in which she wore her hair sticking stiffly out from her nape in two tiny plaits, took on a quality suggestive of a frescoed angel—­a delicately-modelled, faintly-shadowed quality that she might miss in a stronger light.  Putting the saucer of leaven on the untidy dresser, she spoke over her shoulder to her mother.

“I be gwain to give myself a rub over and put on my Sunday gown.  I be gwain now.”

Annie paused in the act of washing a plate, and let the film of dirty water run off it into the pan again.  Then she drew a deep breath, as though the greasy-smelling steam that wavered up towards her nostrils were the sweetest of incense.  Vassilissa, who was accustomed to this silent gathering of the forces before her mother broke into specially impassioned speech, began calmly to untie her pinafore.