‘Shop here, shop there.  The flesh and the devil are gettin’ hold on yo’, and yo’ need more nor iver to seek t’ ways o’ grace.  New year’s day comes and says, “Watch and pray,” and yo’ say, “Nay, I’ll seek feasts and market-places, and let times and seasons come and go without heedin’ into whose presence they’re hastening me.”  Time was, Philip, when thou’d niver ha’ letten a merry-making keep thee fra’ t’ watch-night, and t’ company o’ the godly.’

‘I tell yo’ it was no merry-making to me,’ said Philip, with sharpness, as he left the house.

Alice sat down on the nearest seat, and leant her head on her wrinkled hand.

‘He’s tangled and snared,’ said she; ’my heart has yearned after him, and I esteemed him as one o’ the elect.  And more nor me yearns after him.  O Lord, I have but one child!  O Lord, spare her!  But o’er and above a’ I would like to pray for his soul, that Satan might not have it, for he came to me but a little lad.’

At that moment Philip, smitten by his conscience for his hard manner of speech, came back; but Alice did not hear or see him till he was close by her, and then he had to touch her to recall her attention.

‘Mother,’ said he, ’I was wrong.  I’m fretted by many things.  I shouldn’t ha’ spoken so.  It was ill-done of me.’

‘Oh, my lad!’ said she, looking up and putting her thin arm on his shoulder as he stooped, ‘Satan is desiring after yo’ that he may sift yo’ as wheat.  Bide at whoam, bide at whoam, and go not after them as care nought for holy things.  Why need yo’ go to Haytersbank this night?’

Philip reddened.  He could not and would not give it up, and yet it was difficult to resist the pleading of the usually stern old woman.

‘Nay,’ said he, withdrawing himself ever so little from her hold; ’my aunt is but ailing, they’re my own flesh and blood, and as good folks as needs be, though they mayn’t be o’ our—­o’ your way o’ thinking in a’ things.’

‘Our ways—­your ways o’ thinking, says he, as if they were no longer his’n.  And as good folks as need be,’ repeated she, with returning severity.  ‘Them’s Satan’s words, tho’ yo’ spoke ’em, Philip.  I can do nought again Satan, but I can speak to them as can; an’ we’ll see which pulls hardest, for it’ll be better for thee to be riven and rent i’ twain than to go body and soul to hell.’

‘But don’t think, mother,’ said Philip, his last words of conciliation, for the clock had given warning for two, ‘as I’m boun’ for hell, just because I go t’ see my own folks, all I ha’ left o’ kin.’  And once more, after laying his hand with as much of a caress as was in his nature on hers, he left the house.

Probably Alice would have considered the first words that greeted Philip on his entrance into the shop as an answer to her prayer, for they were such as put a stop to his plan of going to see Sylvia that evening; and if Alice had formed her inchoate thoughts into words, Sylvia would have appeared as the nearest earthly representative of the spirit of temptation whom she dreaded for Philip.