Meanwhile the couple walked together frequently, talked little, and quarrelled more than once. On that warm June night, for instance, when Adam, rolling himself in his blanket, stretched himself in the orchard to sleep under the stars, Alice’s indignation was to the full as great as her mother’s; while the day the girl refused Adam’s offer of pine-cones for her fire, on the ground that they popped like pistols and smelt of turpentine, her lover’s resentment had flashed forth in words fierce and strong. “You do never seem to care for the things what I like,” he summed up. To each the other was an unknown quantity; the mutual attraction was almost counterbalanced by a shyness begotten of the knowledge of being misunderstood. The crisis came one summer’s night--a night long remembered in the village, for there broke such a storm over the land as had not been known, the old folks said, since the days of their childhood. A brooding and oppressive stillness reigned at first, and then came lightning that seemed to split the heavens, and thunder that roared like a thousand menacing cannons. Alice sat crouched in a corner with a face as white as a sheet and her fingers in her ears; and Mrs. Cluett hurried round the house, closing doors and windows, and fastening shutters. As she was about to shut the door leading to the yard, a sudden flash revealed to her a motionless figure standing without, a few paces away. “Dear heart alive! ’Tis never you, Adam.” She had seen his face transfigured in the momentary gleam, the eyes exultant, the lips parted in rapture. “Isn’t it grand?” came Adam’s voice, tremulous with excitement, as the darkness enfolded him once more, and the mystic artillery crashed over their heads. “The chap’s daft!” exclaimed Mrs. Cluett. “Come in this minute. You’ll be struck dead afore me eyes. We don’t want no carpses in the house, do us, Alice?” But Alice made no response. “Lard save us!” ejaculated Mrs. Cluett, as a new flash lit up all the surrounding country, revealing the cattle huddled together in the adjacent fields, the hedges, the trees, Adam’s face, eager, enraptured, as before. She darted out and seized him by the arm. “Come in, I tell ’ee,” she cried. “I’ll not have ye standing there no more.” As he turned towards her half-dazed, she dragged him in, and had shut and bolted the door before he recovered his wits. The air was stifling inside the house; the paraffin lamp reeked; the gusts of storm-wind which arose every now and then puffed volumes of acrid wood smoke down the chimney. “A man mid choke here,” growled Adam. “To bed wi’ ye then!” cried Mrs. Cluett indignantly. “Us be a-goin’ too--’tis late enough.”