My heart began to throb painfully. I turned my face away and leaned against the ash-tree. "Can you see anythin'?" asked one of the labourers who had come up behind me. "Oh! Christ!" I said. I turned quickly from the pond and pressed a way through the gorse. I was overwhelmingly and disgustingly sick. VII By degrees the solid earth ceased to wave and sway before me like a rolling heave of water, and I looked up, pressing my hands to my head--my hands were as cold as death. My clothes were wet and muddy where I had lain on the sodden ground. I got to my feet and instinctively began to brush at the mud. I was still a little giddy, and I swayed and sought for support. I could see the back of one labourer. He was kneeling by the ash-tree bending right down over the water. The other man was standing in the pond, up to his waist in water and mud. I could just see his head and shoulders.... I staggered away in the direction of the village. VIII I found Ellen Mary still sitting in the same chair. The lamp was fluttering to extinction, the flame leaping spasmodically, dying down till it seemed that it had gone out, and then again suddenly flickering up with little clicking bursts of flame. The air reeked intolerably of paraffin. I blew the lamp out and pushed it on one side. There was no need to break the news to Ellen Mary. She had known last night, and now she was beyond the reach of information. She sat upright in her chair and stared out into the immensity. Her hands alone moved, and they were not still for an instant. They lay in her lap, and her fingers writhed and picked at her dress. I spoke to her once, but I knew that her mind was beyond the reach of my words. "It is just as well," I thought; "but we must get her away." I went out and called to the woman next door. She was in her kitchen, but the door was open. She came out when I knocked. "Poor thing," she said, when I told her. "It 'as been a shock, no doubt. She was so wrapped hup in the boy." She could hardly have said less if her neighbour had lost half-a-crown. "Get her into your cottage before they come," I said harshly, and left her. I wanted to get out of the lane before the men came back, but I had hardly started before I saw them coming. They had made a chair of their arms, and were carrying him between them. They had not the least fear of him, now. IX The Harrison idiot suddenly jumped out of the hedge. I put my hand to my throat. I wanted to cry out, to stop him, but I could not move. I felt sick again, and utterly weak and powerless, and I could not take my gaze from that little doll with the great drooping head that rolled as the men walked. I was reminded, disgustingly, of children with a guy. The idiot ran shambling down the lane. He knew the two men, who tolerated him and laughed at him. He was not afraid of them nor their burden. He came right up to them. I heard one of the men say gruffly, "Now then, you cut along off!"