STEVE. Them be good words, Annie, and no mistake. ANNIE. And what you feels about the days gone by don’t count, Steve, ’cause they bain’t true of you. You was always a kind husband, and from what I’ve hear-ed folks say, she was one as wasn’t never suited to neither you nor yours. STEVE. Poor soul, she be dead and gone now, and what I thinks one way or t’other can’t do she no good. Only ’tis upon me as I could take you to-morrow more glad-like, Annie, if so be as I had been kinder to she, the time her was here. ANNIE. Do you go off to bed, Steve, you’re regular done up, and that’s what ’tis. I never hear-ed you take on like this afore. STEVE. All right, my dear, don’t you mind what I’ve been saying. Very like ’tis a bit unnerved as I be this night. But ’tis a good thought, bain’t it, Annie, that come to-morrow at this time, there won’t be no more need for us to part? ANNIE. [_As he opens the door_.] O, ’tis dark outside! [_They both leave the cottage_. MAY _throws back her shawl as though stifled_. _She gets up and first stands bending over_ VASHTI. _Seeing that she is still sleeping heavily_, _she goes to the door_, _opens it gently and looks out_. _After a moment she closes it and walks about the kitchen_, _examining everything with a fierce curiosity_. _She takes up the shawl_ DORRY _has been wearing_, _looks at it hesitatingly_, _and then clasps it passionately to her face_. _Hearing steps outside she flings it down again on the chair and returns to the settle_, _where she sits huddled in the corner_, _having wrapped herself again in her shawl_, _only her eyes looking out unquietly from it_. STEVE _re-enters_. _He bolts the door_, _then goes up to the table in front of the fire to put out the lamp_. STEVE. Can I get you an old sack or summat for to cover you up a bit this cold night? [MAY _looks at him for a moment and then shakes her head_. STEVE. All right. You can just bide where you be on the settle. ’Tis warmer within nor upon the road to-night, and I’ll come and let you out when ’tis morning. [MAY _raises both her hands in an attitude of supplication_. STEVE. [_Pausing_, _with his hand on the burner of the lamp_.] Be there summat as you wants what I can give to you? [MAY _looks at him for a moment and then speaks in a harsh whisper_. MAY. Let I bide quiet in the dark, ’tis all I wants now. [STEVE _puts out the lamp_. STEVE. [_As though to himself_, _as he goes towards the door upstairs_.] Then get off to your drunken sleep again, and your dreams. [_Curtain_. ACT II.—Scene 4. _The fire is almost out_. _A square of moonlight falls on the floor from the window_. VASHTI _still sleeps in the chimney corner_. MAY _is rocking herself to and fro on the settle_. MAY. Get off to your drunken sleep and to your dreams! Your dreams—your dreams—Ah, where is it as they have gone, I’d like for to know. The dreams as comed to I when I was laid beneath the hedge. Dreams!