Beth, still leaning against the door-post, clasped her hands behind her head and looked up at the sky. "Things keep coming to me faster than I can say them to-night," she proceeded, paying no heed to his remark; "not things about you, though, because nothing goes with Sammy but jammy, clammy, mammy, and those aren't nice. I want things to come about you, but they won't. I tried last night in bed, and what do you think came again and again? Yes, yes, that was his cry, While the great clouds went sailing by; Flashes of crimson on colder sky; Like the thoughts of a summer's day, Colour'd by love in a life which else were grey. But that isn't you, you know, Sammy. Then when I stopped trying for something about you, there came such a singing! What was it? It seems to have gone--and yet it's here, you know, it's all here," she insisted, with one hand on the top of her head, and the other on her chest, and her eyes straining; "and yet I can't get it." "Beth, don't get on like that," Sammy remonstrated. "You make me feel all horrid." "Make you feel," Beth cried in a deep voice, clenching her fists and shaking them at him, exasperated because the verses continued to elude her. "Don't you know what I'm here for? I'm here to make you feel. If you don't feel what I feel, then you _shall_ feel horrid, if I have to kill you." "Shut up!" said Sammy, beginning to be frightened. "I shall go away if you don't." "Go away, then," said Beth. "You're just an idiot boy, and I'm tired of you." Sammy's blue eyes filled with tears. He got down from the heap of sticks, intent on making his escape; but Beth changed her mind when she felt her audience melting away. "Where are you going?" she demanded. "I'm going home," he said deprecatingly. "I can't stay if you go on in that fool-fashion." "It isn't a fool-fashion," Beth rejoined vehemently. "It's you that's a fool. I told you so before." "If you wasn't a girl, I'd punch your 'ead," said Sammy, half afraid. "I believe you!" Beth jeered. "But you're not a girl, anyway." She flew at him as she spoke, caught him by the collar, kicked his shins, slapped his face, and drubbed him on the back. Sammy, overwhelmed by the sudden onslaught, made no effort to defend himself, but just wriggled out of her grasp, and ran home, with great tears streaming down his round red cheeks, and sobs convulsing him. Beth's exasperation subsided the moment she was left alone in the wood-house. She sat down on the sticks, and looked straight before her, filled with remorse. "What shall I do? What shall I do?" she kept saying to herself. "Oh dear! oh dear! Sammy! Sammy! He's gone. I've lost him. _This is the most dreadful grief I have ever had in my life._"