Connie went to the wood directly after lunch. It was really a lovely day, the first dandelions making suns, the first daisies so white. The hazel thicket was a lace-work, of half-open leaves, and the last dusty perpendicular of the catkins. Yellow celandines now were in crowds, flat open, pressed back in urgency, and the yellow glitter of themselves. It was the yellow, the powerful yellow of early summer. And primroses were broad, and full of pale abandon, thick-clustered primroses no longer shy. The lush, dark green of hyacinths was a sea, with buds rising like pale corn, while in the riding the forget-me-nots were fluffing up, and columbines were unfolding their ink-purple ruches, and there were bits of blue bird's eggshell under a bush. Everywhere the bud-knots and the leap of life!
The keeper was not at the hut. Everything was serene, brown chickens running lustily. Connie walked on towards the cottage, because she wanted to find him.

The cottage stood in the sun, off the wood's edge. In the little garden the double daffodils rose in tufts, near the wide-open door, and red double daisies made a border to the path. There was the bark of a dog, and Flossie came running.

The wide-open door! so he was at home. And the sunlight falling on the red-brick floor! As she went up the path, she saw him through the window, sitting at the table in his shirt-sleeves, eating. The dog wuffed softly, slowly wagging her tail.

He rose, and came to the door, wiping his mouth with a red handkerchief still chewing.

`May I come in?' she said.

`Come in!'

The sun shone into the bare room, which still smelled of a mutton chop, done in a dutch oven before the fire, because the dutch oven still stood on the fender, with the black potato-saucepan on a piece of paper, beside it on the white hearth. The fire was red, rather low, the bar dropped, the kettle singing.

On the table was his plate, with potatoes and the remains of the chop; also bread in a basket, salt, and a blue mug with beer. The table-cloth was white oil-cloth, he stood in the shade.

`You are very late,' she said. `Do go on eating!'

She sat down on a wooden chair, in the sunlight by the door.

`I had to go to Uthwaite,' he said, sitting down at the table but not eating.

`Do eat,' she said. But he did not touch the food.

`Shall y'ave something?' he asked her. `Shall y'ave a cup of tea? t' kettle's on t' boil'---he half rose again from his chair.

`If you'll let me make it myself,' she said, rising. He seemed sad, and she felt she was bothering him.

`Well, tea-pot's in there'---he pointed to a little, drab corner cupboard; 'an' cups. An' tea's on t' mantel ower yer 'ead,'

She got the black tea-pot, and the tin of tea from the mantel-shelf. She rinsed the tea-pot with hot water, and stood a moment wondering where to empty it.

`Throw it out,' he said, aware of her. `It's clean.'

She went to the door and threw the drop of water down the path. How lovely it was here, so still, so really woodland. The oaks were putting out ochre yellow leaves: in the garden the red daisies were like red plush buttons. She glanced at the big, hollow sandstone slab of the threshold, now crossed by so few feet.

`But it's lovely here,' she said. `Such a beautiful stillness, everything alive and still.'

He was eating again, rather slowly and unwillingly, and she could feel he was discouraged. She made the tea in silence, and set the tea-pot on the hob, as she knew the people did. He pushed his plate aside and went to the back place; she heard a latch click, then he came back with cheese on a plate, and butter.

She set the two cups on the table; there were only two. `Will you have a cup of tea?' she said.

`If you like. Sugar's in th' cupboard, an' there's a little cream jug. Milk's in a jug in th' pantry.'

`Shall I take your plate away?' she asked him. He looked up at her with a faint ironical smile.

`Why...if you like,' he said, slowly eating bread and cheese. She went to the back, into the pent-house scullery, where the pump was. On the left was a door, no doubt the pantry door. She unlatched it, and almost smiled at the place he called a pantry; a long narrow white-washed slip of a cupboard. But it managed to contain a little barrel of beer, as well as a few dishes and bits of food. She took a little milk from the yellow jug.

`How do you get your milk?' she asked him, when she came back to the table.

`Flints! They leave me a bottle at the warren end. You know, where I met you!'

But he was discouraged. She poured out the tea, poising the cream-jug.

`No milk,' he said; then he seemed to hear a noise, and looked keenly through the doorway.

`'Appen we'd better shut,' he said.

`It seems a pity,' she replied. `Nobody will come, will they?'

`Not unless it's one time in a thousand, but you never know.'

`And even then it's no matter,' she said. `It's only a cup of tea.'

`Where are the spoons?'

He reached over, and pulled open the table drawer. Connie sat at the table in the sunshine of the doorway.

`Flossie!' he said to the dog, who was lying on a little mat at the stair foot. `Go an' hark, hark!'

He lifted his finger, and his `hark!' was very vivid. The dog trotted out to reconnoitre.

`Are you sad today?' she asked him.

He turned his blue eyes quickly, and gazed direct on her.

`Sad! no, bored! I had to go getting summonses for two poachers I caught, and, oh well, I don't like people.'

He spoke cold, good English, and there was anger in his voice. `Do you hate being a game-keeper?' she asked.

`Being a game-keeper, no! So long as I'm left alone. But when I have to go messing around at the police-station, and various other places, and waiting for a lot of fools to attend to me...oh well, I get mad...' and he smiled, with a certain faint humour.

`Couldn't you be really independent?' she asked.

`Me? I suppose I could, if you mean manage to exist on my pension. I could! But I've got to work, or I should die. That is, I've got to have something that keeps me occupied. And I'm not in a good enough temper to work for myself. It's got to be a sort of job for somebody else, or I should throw it up in a month, out of bad temper. So altogether I'm very well off here, especially lately...'

He laughed at her again, with mocking humour.

`But why are you in a bad temper?' she asked. `Do you mean you are always in a bad temper?'

`Pretty well,' he said, laughing. `I don't quite digest my bile.'

`But what bile?' she said.

`Bile!' he said. `Don't you know what that is?' She was silent, and disappointed. He was taking no notice of her.

`I'm going away for a while next month,' she said.

`You are! Where to?'

`Venice! With Sir Clifford? For how long?'

`For a month or so,' she replied. `Clifford won't go.'

`He'll stay here?' he asked.

`Yes! He hates to travel as he is.'

`Ay, poor devil!' he said, with sympathy. There was a pause.

`You won't forget me when I'm gone, will you?' she asked. Again he lifted his eyes and looked full at her.

`Forget?' he said. `You know nobody forgets. It's not a question of memory;'

She wanted to say: `When then?' but she didn't. Instead, she said in a mute kind of voice: `I told Clifford I might have a child.'

Now he really looked at her, intense and searching.

`You did?' he said at last. `And what did he say?'

`Oh, he wouldn't mind. He'd be glad, really, so long as it seemed to be his.' She dared not look up at him.

He was silent a long time, then he gazed again on her face.

`No mention of me, of course?' he said.

`No. No mention of you,' she said.

`No, he'd hardly swallow me as a substitute breeder. Then where are you supposed to be getting the child?'

`I might have a love-affair in Venice,' she said.

`You might,' he replied slowly. `So that's why you're going?'

`Not to have the love-affair,' she said, looking up at him, pleading.

`Just the appearance of one,' he said.

There was silence. He sat staring out the window, with a faint grin, half mockery, half bitterness, on his face. She hated his grin.

`You've not taken any precautions against having a child then?' he asked her suddenly. `Because I haven't.'

`No,' she said faintly. `I should hate that.'

He looked at her, then again with the peculiar subtle grin out of the window. There was a tense silence.

At last he turned his head and said satirically:

`That was why you wanted me, then, to get a child?'

She hung her head.

`No. Not really,' she said. `What then, really?' he asked rather bitingly.

She looked up at him reproachfully, saying: `I don't know.'

He broke into a laugh.

`Then I'm damned if I do,' he said.

There was a long pause of silence, a cold silence.

`Well,' he said at last. `It's as your Ladyship likes. If you get the baby, Sir Clifford's welcome to it. I shan't have lost anything. On the contrary, I've had a very nice experience, very nice indeed!'---and he stretched in a half-suppressed sort of yawn. `If you've made use of me,' he said, `it's not the first time I've been made use of; and I don't suppose it's ever been as pleasant as this time; though of course one can't feel tremendously dignified about it.'---He stretched again, curiously, his muscles quivering, and his jaw oddly set.

`But I didn't make use of you,' she said, pleading.

`At your Ladyship's service,' he replied.

`No,' she said. `I liked your body.'

`Did you?' he replied, and he laughed. `Well, then, we're quits, because I liked yours.'

He looked at her with queer darkened eyes.

`Would you like to go upstairs now?' he asked her, in a strangled sort of voice.

`No, not here. Not now!' she said heavily, though if he had used any power over her, she would have gone, for she had no strength against him.

He turned his face away again, and seemed to forget her. `I want to touch you like you touch me,' she said. `I've never really touched your body.'

He looked at her, and smiled again. `Now?' he said. `No! No! Not here! At the hut. Would you mind?'

`How do I touch you?' he asked.

`When you feel me.'

He looked at her, and met her heavy, anxious eyes.

`And do you like it when I feel you?' he asked, laughing at her still.

`Yes, do you?' she said.

`Oh, me!' Then he changed his tone. `Yes,' he said. `You know without asking.' Which was true.

She rose and picked up her hat. `I must go,' she said.

`Will you go?' he replied politely.

She wanted him to touch her, to say something to her, but he said nothing, only waited politely.

`Thank you for the tea,' she said.

`I haven't thanked your Ladyship for doing me the honours of my tea-pot,' he said.

She went down the path, and he stood in the doorway, faintly grinning. Flossie came running with her tail lifted. And Connie had to plod dumbly across into the wood, knowing he was standing there watching her, with that incomprehensible grin on his face.

She walked home very much downcast and annoyed. She didn't at all like his saying he had been made use of because, in a sense, it was true. But he oughtn't to have said it. Therefore, again, she was divided between two feelings: resentment against him, and a desire to make it up with him.

She passed a very uneasy and irritated tea-time, and at once went up to her room. But when she was there it was no good; she could neither sit nor stand. She would have to do something about it. She would have to go back to the hut; if he was not there, well and good.

She slipped out of the side door, and took her way direct and a little sullen. When she came to the clearing she was terribly uneasy. But there he was again, in his shirt-sleeves, stooping, letting the hens out of the coops, among the chicks that were now growing a little gawky, but were much more trim than hen-chickens.

She went straight across to him. `You see I've come!' she said.

`Ay, I see it!' he said, straightening his back, and looking at her with a faint amusement.

`Do you let the hens out now?' she asked.

`Yes, they've sat themselves to skin and bone,' he said. `An' now they're not all that anxious to come out an' feed. There's no self in a sitting hen; she's all in the eggs or the chicks.'

The poor mother-hens; such blind devotion! even to eggs not their own! Connie looked at them in compassion. A helpless silence fell between the man and the woman.

`Shall us go i' th' 'ut?' he asked.

`Do you want me?' she asked, in a sort of mistrust.

`Ay, if you want to come.'

She was silent.

`Come then!' he said.

And she went with him to the hut. It was quite dark when he had shut the door, so he made a small light in the lantern, as before.

`Have you left your underthings off?' he asked her.

`Yes!'

`Ay, well, then I'll take my things off too.'

He spread the blankets, putting one at the side for a coverlet. She took off her hat, and shook her hair. He sat down, taking off his shoes and gaiters, and undoing his cord breeches.

`Lie down then!' he said, when he stood in his shirt. She obeyed in silence, and he lay beside her, and pulled the blanket over them both.

`There!' he said.

And he lifted her dress right back, till he came even to her breasts. He kissed them softly, taking the nipples in his lips in tiny caresses.

`Eh, but tha'rt nice, tha'rt nice!' he said, suddenly rubbing his face with a snuggling movement against her warm belly.

And she put her arms round him under h............