“Undoubtedly I’m a lost soul,” he went on. “Widow Lister told me as much last night, when she caught me riding home, and got me to poultice a boil the size of a pin-head, and then gave me a sermon because I hadn’t the fear o’ the Lord in me. ‘If I’d as much fear of the Lord, Widow, as you have of your body,’ I said, ‘they’d count me righteous in Garth.’” Reuben laughed. He knew Widow Lister, and the doctor’s racy tongue had brought the picture clearly to his mind. And somehow neither wished to get on with the business of the day, for each knew at last that, in their separate ways, they had faced adversity with some show of courage. “I’ve a weakness for Widow Mathewson myself; I’d the same feeling for poor Peggy,” said the doctor presently. “I begin to have the like feeling for you, Mr. Gaunt.” “What sort of feeling, doctor?” “Well, a ‘birds-of-a-feather’ feeling. We’re up on the same moor-top, we. There’s little of the heathen in me, I’ve seen too much of human sorrow to feel aught but fear o’ God. But my God’s different--yours is, and the widow’s is, and poor Peggy’s was--and I catch a sight of Him when I’m riding over the moor, Mr. Gaunt, at the end of a long day’s work, and the hills get up in front of my fiddle-headed horse, and the wind blows low through the heather, and I listen to the fairies. Oh, we doctor-folk learn a thing or two, when we ride with tired bodies and clear eyes, over the moor-top home to supper.” Gaunt had not been permitted to see this side of the man before; and his surprise showed in his face, perhaps, for the doctor gathered up his reins and laughed shamefacedly. “No, no, Mr. Gaunt,” he said in his gruffest voice, “I’m not going to enter any ministry. Foolish thoughts _will_ slip out at times. Now, you mean to stay here awhile longer? I think I’ll ride home by way of Marshlands, all the same. Scared as they are, they’ll be glad of my news. I shall tell that hulking hind of yours, Peter Wood, to bring you up a change of clothes and linen. It was useless before, but now you can burn all you stand up in, and put on something that doesn’t carry any memory of the fever with it. You’ve burned all the sick-room things, by the way--bedding, and hangings, and what not?” Gaunt nodded. “And whitewashed every corner afterwards. Mrs. Mathewson would have it so.” “Bless me, a couple of sensible folk seem to be living up at Ghyll Farm! All as practical and trim as if I’d had the overlooking of it myself.” “Well, you see, doctor,” said the other, with a smile that had no mirth in it, “it was a big job we’d undertaken, and big jobs are worth doing thoroughly, once you take them up. There was no need for us to help Ghyll become a plague spot for the whole of Garth.” “Oh, the world’s standing on her head, Mr. Gaunt! The tough old doctor suspected of leanings towards the ministry, and you preaching thoroughness. There, there, I must have my jest. There’s no offence, I hope?”