n value for my money.

JUDITH:
Peace and quiet
And a good home are worth ...

BELL:
But, you've no turn
For circuses: your heart's a pipeclayed hearthstone--
No ring for hoofs to trample to the clang
Of cymbals, blare of trumpets, rattle of drums:
No dash of brandy in your stirabout:
Porridge in peace, with a door 'twixt you and the weather;
A sanded floor; and the glow and smother of peat:
But I'd rather be a lean pig, running free,
Than the fattest flitch of bacon on the rafters.

JUDITH:
And yet, you've kept ...

BELL:
Ay: but my fingers have itched
Sorely to fire the peatstack in a west wind,
That flames might swarm walls and rooftree, and Krindlesyke,
Perishing in a crackle and golden flare-up,
Tumble a smoking ruin of blackened stone.

JUDITH:
Yet, you've kept house ...

BELL:
Ay, true enough; I've been
Cook, slut, and butler here this fifteen-year,
As thrang as Throp's wife when she hanged herself
With her own dishclout. Needs must, the fire will burn,
Barred in the grate: burn--nay, I've only smouldered
Like sodden peat. Ay, true, I've drudged; and yet,
What could I do against that old dead witch,
Lying in wait for me the day I came?
Her very patience was a kind of cunning
That challenged me, hinting I'd not have grit
To stand her life, even for a dozen years.
What could I do, but prove I could stick it out?
If I'd turned tail, she'd have bared her toothless gums
To grin at me: and how could I go through life,
Haunted by her dead smile? But now the spell
Is snapt: I've proved her wrong: she cannot hold me.
I've served my sentence: the cell-door opens: and yet,
You would have done that fifteen-years-hard willingly?
Some folk can only thrive in gaol--no nerve
To face the risks outside; and never happy
Till lagged for life: meals punctual and no cares:
And the king for landlord. While I've eaten my head off,
You've been a galled jade, fretting for the stable.
Tastes differ: but it's just that you're not my sort
Puzzles me why you gave yourself to Jim.

JUDITH:
There are no whys and wherefores, when you love.

BELL:
I gave myself to Peter, with a difference.
You'd have wed Jim: I just let Peter travel
With me, to keep the others from pestering;
And scooted him when Michael could manage the sheep.

JUDITH:
You never loved him. I loved Jim ...

BELL: