wink since, you may guess.
When I heard "Barrasford of Krindlesyke,"
My heart went cold within me, thinking of Jim,
And what he'd been to me. I'd had no news
Of all that's happened since I left the day
Jim wedded; and ...

BELL:
The nowt felt like a poacher,
When keeper's sneaked his bunny, and broken his snare?

JUDITH:
I fancied he, perhaps ...

BELL:
Ay, likely enough.
Jim's wasted a sight of matches, since that day
He burnt his fingers so badly: but he's not kindled
A hearthfire yet at Krindlesyke. Anyway,
For Michael to be his son, I'd need to be
Even an older flame of his than you:
For Michael's twenty-one.

JUDITH:
As old as that?
But I could never rest, till I'd made sure.
Knowing myself, I did not question Ruth ...

BELL:
What's worth the kenning's seldom learned by speiring.

JUDITH:
Though, knowing myself, I dreaded what might chance,
What might already ...

BELL:
You'd no cause to worrit
Michael's not that sort: he's respectable--
Too staid and sober for his tinker-mother:
He'll waste no matches, lighting wayside fires.

JUDITH:
Like me, Ruth's easy kindled; hard to quench--
A flying spark, and the heather's afire in a gale;
And the fell's burned to the rock--naught but black ash,
When the downpour comes, too late.

BELL:
Ay--but the flare,
And crackle, and tossing flames, and golden smoke;
And the sting of the reek in the nostrils!

JUDITH:
Ruth'll love
Once and for all: like me, she's born for marriage:
Though, in my eager trustfulness, I missed it.
You'll scorn me, as I often scorn myself:
But, kenning the worst, in my heart of hearts, I hanker ...
Jim meant so much to me once: I can't forget,
Or keep from dwelling on the might-have-been.
Snow on the felltop, now: but underground
Fire smoulders still: and still might burst to flame.
Deceived and broken ...

BELL:
What's this jackadandy,
That you and Phoebe, both--and kenning him!

JUDITH:
What's kenning got to do with love? It makes
No difference, once you've given ...

BELL:
If I've a heart,
And it's broken, it's a broken stone, sunk deep
In bottomless mosshags, where no heat can touch it,
Till the whole world grills, at last, on hell's gridiron.

JUDITH:
Nothing you ken of broken hearts, or