The family was forbidden to speak of the absent sons. No one ever wrote to Robert in Lewes gaol or to Albert living on London's cruel tender-mercies. The shame of them was to be starved by silence. Soon most of the children had forgotten them, and they lived solely in Tilly's unhappy thoughts or Richard's angry ones, or in certain bitter memories of their father's, sternly fought. Reuben had learnt his first lesson from experience. Quietly but decidedly he altered his conduct. He no longer made the slightest appeal to his family's enterprise or ambition, he no longer interrupted his chidings with those pathetic calls to their enthusiasm which had mystified or irritated them in times past. On the other hand he was twice as hard, twice as fierce, twice as ruthless and masterful as he had ever been. Old Mrs. Backfield was getting very decrepit. She could not walk without a stick, and her knotted hands were of little use either in the kitchen or the dairy. Reuben was anxious to avoid engaging anyone to help her, yet the developments of her sphere made such help most necessary. Odiam now supplied most of the neighbouring gentry with milk, butter, and eggs; the poultry-yard had grown enormously since it had been a mere by-way of Mrs. Backfield's labours, and she and the girls also had charge of the young calves and pigs, which needed constant attention, and meant a great deal of hard work. Besides this, there was all the housework to do, sweeping, dusting, cooking, baking, and mending and washing for the males. It occurred to Reuben that Harry might be of some use to the women. Since he had given up fiddling he was entirely on the wrong side of Odiam's accounts; it would do much to justify his existence if he could help a little in the house and thus save engaging extra labour. Unfortunately Harry's ideas of work were fantastic, and he was, besides, hindered by his blindness. Any use he could be put to was more than balanced by the number of things he broke. His madness had of late developed both a terrible and an irritating side. He was sometimes consumed by the idea that the house was burning, and had on one or two occasions scared the family by jumping out of bed in the middle of the night and running about the passages shouting--"The house is afire! the house is afire! Oh, God save us all!" After he had done this once or twice, young Piper was made to sleep in his room, but even so he was often visited by his terrors during the day, and would interrupt work or meals with shrieks of--"The house is afire! Oh, wot shall we do! The house is afire, and the children are burning." Another habit of his, less alarming, but far more annoying, was to repeat some chance word or sentence over and over again for hours. If his mother said "Take these plates into the kitchen, Harry," he would spend the rest of the day murmuring, "Take these plates into the kitchen, Harry," till those about him were driven nearly as mad as he.