the money, Rhoda!"

She handed him the money-bags.

He seized them, and dashed them to the ground with the force of madness.
Kneeling, he drew out his penknife, and slit the sides of the bags, and
held them aloft, and let the gold pour out in torrents, insufferable to
the sight; and uttering laughter that clamoured fierily in her ears for
long minutes afterwards, the old man brandished the empty bags, and
sprang out of the room.

She sat dismayed in the centre of a heap of gold.

CHAPTER XLI

On the Monday evening, Master Gammon was at the station with the cart.
Robert and Rhoda were a train later, but the old man seemed to be unaware
of any delay, and mildly staring, received their apologies, and nodded.
They asked him more than once whether all was well at the Farm; to which
he replied that all was quite well, and that he was never otherwise.
About half-an-hour after, on the road, a gradual dumb chuckle overcame
his lower features. He flicked the horse dubitatively, and turned his
head, first to Robert, next to Rhoda; and then he chuckled aloud:

"The last o' they mel'ns rotted yest'day afternoon!"

"Did they?" said Robert. "You'll have to get fresh seed, that's all."

Master Gammon merely showed his spirit to be negative.

"You've been playing the fool with the sheep," Robert accused him.

It hit the old man in a very tender part.

"I play the fool wi' ne'er a sheep alive, Mr. Robert. Animals likes their
'customed food, and don't like no other. I never changes my food, nor'd
e'er a sheep, nor'd a cow, nor'd a bullock, if animals was masters. I'd
as lief give a sheep beer, as offer him, free-handed--of my own will,
that's to say--a mel'n. They rots."

Robert smiled, though he was angry. The delicious unvexed country-talk
soothed Rhoda, and she looked fondly on the old man, believing that he
could not talk on in his sedate way, if all were not well at home.

The hills of the beacon-ridge beyond her home, and the line of stunted
firs, which she had named "the old bent beggarmen," were visible in the
twilight. Her eyes flew thoughtfully far over them, with the feeling that
they had long known what would come to her and to those dear to her, and
the intense hope that they knew no more, inasmuch as they bounded her
sight.

"If the sheep thrive," she ventured to remark, so that the comforting old
themes might be kept up.

"That's the particular 'if!'" said Robert, signifying something that had
to be