On his last evening, he went up to Worge to say good-bye. He felt already as if he did not belong to the place. Harry’s drastic dealings with the tilth seemed to have taken the fields away from him—he no longer felt even a distant guardianship of those brown-ribbed acres which had been green when he worked on them. He felt, too, with a sense of estrangement, the dirt and litter of the house, the muddling business which at six o’clock had Ivy swilling out the scullery and Mrs. Beatup still struggling with the washing. Thyrza never did a stroke of housework after dinner, and yet her morning’s tasks were never hurried; she never had Ivy’s flushed, red face and tousled hair, or Mrs. Beatup’s forehead shiny with sweat.

His family were conscious of this—conscious that he now had a standard of comparison by which to measure their short-comings, and it made them sulkily suspicious in their attitude. He was already the alien—the bird that has left the nest, the puppy that has grown up and gone a-hunting on his own. But this sense of estrangement [148] only seemed to make his parting sadder, for he vaguely felt as if he had left them before he need, had already divided himself from them by an earlier good-bye, of which this was only the echo and the ghost.

Mrs. Beatup enquired politely after Thyrza, and sent Ivy out to fetch in the others. Zacky climbed on Tom’s knee and asked him to send him home a German helmet, and Harry—whose heart was really very warm and loving towards Tom—stood shyly behind his chair and could not speak a word. Mus’ Beatup gave Tom an account of the Battle of the Ancre, but failed to create the usual respectful impression.

“You see, faather, I was out there, and I know that it happened different. St. Quentin aun’t anywhere near the Rhine.”

“There’s more’n one St. Quentin, saum as there’s more’n one Mockbeggar, and more’n one Iden Green. How do you know as there’s no St. Quentin on the Rhine? You’ve never bin there, and you’ll never be there, nuther.”

“I reckon I’ll be there before I’m many months older.”

“You woan’t,” said Mus’ Beatup solemnly, “it’s more likely as the Germans ull be crossing the River Cuckmere than as you’ll ever be crossing the River Rhine. Now, be quiet, Nell, and a-done do, fur I tell you it’s bin proved as we’ll never git to the River Rhine, so where’s the sense of going on wud the war, I’d like to know?”

“To prevent the Germans crossing the River Cuckmere,” snapped Nell.

“Oh, doan’t go talking such tar’ble stuff,” moaned Mrs. Beatup. “If the Germans caum here I’d die of fits.”

“They woan’t come here,” said her husband, “and [149] we’ll never git there, so wot’s the sense of all this v............