“Saving and skinching and piling up,” he went on. “What good has it ever done you, Esther? Why didn’t you and ’Caje knock off and have a little fun together in the world before you got hardened this way? And for poor ’Cilia it was always ‘Sometime!’ till she got to be sixteen years old, and then she went on the first journey of her life--to the grave! And the only good dress she ever wore was the one you laid her out in! Do you know what animals grub and grub with their noses rooting soil?” He shouted the question at her. She came back at him with equal fire. “When I want a sermon I’ll go to the parson! ’Tain’t any disgrace to be prudent and forehanded, is it, even if we ain’t got no one to enjoy it after we’re gone?” Her voice broke suddenly. The tears flooded into her cold eyes. “Oh, Squire,” she quavered, “’twould have been different with ’Caje and me if only ’Cilla’d been left to us. Hain’t neither of us knowed what to do with ourselves since we laid her away in the graveyard.” He walked around the table and patted the shoulder bowed under the faded shawl. “And as little as you’ve got left in the world now, Esther, here you are wanting to get rid of the biggest hunk of it. Can’t you realise that you don’t understand this thing yet? Your husband don’t know what the trouble is with him. Now let me tear up this list of ’Caje’s temporary aberrations. I’ll have a talk with him, and we’ll see--we’ll see!” But with an angry red in her cheeks that seemed to scorch the tears there she jerked her shoulder away from his patting hand. “Squire Phin, you’ve known me from a little snippet, and you know I ain’t flyin’ off to no tangents without good reason. It ain’t no one night’s growth, this ain’t. I’m going to have a bill from that man, I say! The neighbours ain’t goin’ to have a chance to say _I’ve_ backed down. If you don’t want to take the case, then out with it, bus’nesslike, and I’ll go farther. But that _di_-vose I’m goin’ to have!” There was no gainsaying her angry obstinacy. “Well, Esther,” he said with a sigh, “leave the papers and I’ll have notice of the libel served.” “When? There can’t be no more fubbin’. The neighbours are all stirred up, and I’ve made my talk!” “To-morrow.” “So do! And I’ll plan according,” she snapped, and with lips set tight she left the room. The Squire slowly filled his pipe, his eyes fixed in unblinking stare on a far corner. “Neighbours!” he snorted. “Poor little gaffer of a girl, and the whole of ’em pecking at her!” He aimlessly searched for a match in his pockets, his eyes still on the corner. “Oh, Sylvie,” he murmured, “they are just ready to bury their beaks in you if you step between--oh-h-h!” In sudden impotent choler he snapped the stem of the unlighted pipe, threw the pieces into the corner and went out, shutting his office door behind him with a vehemence that made the building shiver. CHAPTER VII--THE BUSINESS OF HUMAN HEARTS THAT CALLED SQUIRE PHIN TO THE COVE ROAD