er head. "Only an hour and a half, Jim. I must be back for
tea."

"Yo'll 'ave tae here. Yo've had it before. I'll maake it for yo."

"I daren't, Jim. They'll expect me. They'll wonder."

"Ay, 'tis thot waay always. Yo're no sooner coom than yo've got to be
back for this, thot and toother. I'm fair sick of it."

"So am I."

She sighed.

"Wall then--yo must end it."

"How can I end it?"

"Yo knaw how."

"Oh Jim--darling--haven't I told you?"

"Yo've toald mae noothin' that makes a hap'orth o' difference to mae.
Yo've coom to mae. Thot's all I keer for."

He put his hand on her shoulder and turned her toward the house-place.

"Let me shaw yo t' house--now you've coom."

His voice pleaded and persuaded. In spite of its north-country accent
Ally loved his voice. It sounded musical and mournful, like the voices
of the mountain sheep coming from far across the moor and purified by
distance.

He took her through the kitchen and the little parlor at the end of
the house.

As he looked round it, trying to see it with her eyes, doubt came to
him. But Ally, standing there, looked toward the kitchen.

"Will Maggie be there?" she said.

"Ay, Maaggie'll be there, ready when yo want her."

"But," she said, "I don't want her."

He followed her look.

"I'll 'ave it all claned oop and paapered and paainted. Look yo--I
could have a hole knocked through t' back wall o' t' kitchen and a
winder put there--and roon oop a wooden partition and make a passage
for yo t' goa to yore awn plaace, soa's Maaggie'll not bae in yore
road."

"You needn't. I like it best as it is."

"Do yo? D'yo mind thot Soonda yo caame laasst year? Yo've aassked mae
whan it was I started thinkin' of yo. It was than. Thot daay whan yo
sot there in thot chair by t' fire, taalkin' t' mae and drinkin' yore
tae so pretty."

She drew closer to him.

"Did you really love me then?"

"Ay--I looved yo than."

She pondered it.

"Jim--what would you have done if I hadn't loved you?"

He choked back something in his throat before he answered her. "What
sud I have doon? I sud have goan on looving yo joost the saame.

"We'll goa oopstairs now."

He took her back and out through the kitchen and up the stone stairs
that turned sharply in their narrow place in the wall. He opened the
door at the head of the landing.

"This would bae our room. 'Tis t' best."

He took her into the room where John Greatorex had died. It was the
marriage chamber,