She made polite protestations, but he would not listen to them. He strode on beside her in a stormy silence, till the impulse to prick him overmastered her. "Do you generally sit with the cows?" she asked him sweetly. She shot her grey eyes towards him, all mockery and cool examination. He was not accustomed to such looks from the young women whom he chose to notice. "I was not going to stay and be treated like that before strangers!" he said, with a sulky fierceness. "Mother thinks she and Daffady can just have their own way with me, as they'd used to do when I was nobbut a lad. But I'll let her know--aye, and the men too!" "But if you hate farming, why don't you let Daffady do the work?" Her sly voice stung him afresh. "Because I'll be mëaster!" he said, bringing his hand violently down on the shaft of the pony cart. "If I'm to stay on in this beastly hole I'll make every one knaw their place. Let mother give me some money, an I'll soon take myself off, an leave her an Daffady to draw their own water their own way. But if I'm here I'm _mëaster_!" He struck the cart again. "Is it true you don't work nearly as hard as your father?" He looked at her amazed. If Susie Flinders down at the mill had spoken to him like that, he would have known how to shut her mouth for her. "An I daur say it is," he said hotly. "I'm not goin to lead the dog's life my father did--all for the sake of diddlin another sixpence or two oot o' the neighbours. Let mother give me my money oot o' the farm. I'd go to Froswick fast enough. That's the place to get on. I've got friends--I'd work up in no time." Laura glanced at him. She said nothing. "You doan't think I would?" he asked her angrily, pausing in his handling of the harness to throw back the challenge of her manner. His wrath seemed to have made him handsomer, better-braced, more alive. Physically she admired him for the first time, as he stood confronting her. But she only lifted her eyebrows a little. "I thought one had to have a particular kind of brains for business--and begin early, too?" "I could learn," he said gruffly, after which they were both silent till the harnessing was done. Then he looked up. "I'd like to drive you to the bridge--if you're agreeable?" "Oh, don't trouble yourself, pray!" she said in polite haste. His brows knit again. "I know how 'tis--you won't come here again." Her little face changed. "I'd like to," she said, her voice wavering, "because papa used to stay here." He stared at her. "I do remember Cousin Stephen," he said at last, "though I towd you I didn't. I can see him standing at the door there--wi' a big hat--an a beard--like straw--an a check coat wi' great bulgin pockets." He stopped in amazement, seeing the sudden beauty of her eyes and cheeks. "That's it," she said, leaning towards him. "Oh, that's it!" She closed her eyes a moment, her small lips trembling. Then she opened them with a long breath. "Yes, you may drive me to the bridge if you like."