roof. And
he had made himself two fine new rooms, a dining-room and a nursery,
one above the other, within the blind walls of the house where the old
granary had been. The walls were blind no longer, for he had knocked
four large windows out of them. And it was as if one-half of the house
were awake and staring while the other half, in its old and alien
beauty, dozed and dreamed under its scowling mullions.

As Gwenda came to it she wondered how the Farm could ever have seemed
sinister and ghost-haunted; it had become so entirely the place of
happy life.

Loud noises came from the open windows of the dining-room where the
family were at tea; the barking of dogs, the competitive laughter of
small children, a gurgling and crowing and spluttering; with now and
then the sudden delicate laughter of Ally and the bellowing of Jim.

"Oh--there's Gwenda!" said Ally.

Jim stopped between a bellowing and a choking, for his mouth was full.

"Ay--it's 'er."

He washed down his mouthful. "Coom, Ally, and open door t' 'er."

But Ally did not come. She had her year-old baby on her knees and was
feeding him.

At the door of the old kitchen Jim grasped his sister-in-law by the
hand.

"Thot's right," he said. "Yo've joost coom in time for a cup o' tae.
T' misses is in there wi' t' lil uns."

He jerked his thumb toward his dining-room and led the way there.

Jim was not quite so alert and slender as he had been. He had lost his
savage grace. But he moved with his old directness and dignity, and he
still looked at you with his pathetic, mystic gaze.

Ally was contrite; she raised her face to her sister to be kissed. "I
can't get up," she said, "I'm feeding Baby. He'd howl if I left off."

"I'd let 'im howl. I'd spank him ef 'twas me," said Jim.

"He wouldn't, Gwenda."

"Ay, thot I would. An' 'e knows it, doos Johnny, t' yoong rascal."

Gwenda kissed the four children; Jimmy, and Gwendolen Alice, and
little Steven and the baby John. They lifted little sticky faces and
wiped them on Gwenda's face, and the happy din went on.

Ally didn't seem to mind it. She had grown plump and pink and rather
like Mary without her subtlety. She sat smiling, tranquil among the
cries of her offspring.

Jim turned three dogs out into the yard by way of discipline. He and
Ally tried to talk to each other across the tumult that remained. Now
and then Ally and the children talked to Gwenda. They told her that
the black and white cow had calve