ALL day long the whirr of the reaper and binder had rattled from distant fields in a monotone of sound broken at regular intervals by guttural cries when the horses at a corner turned on their tracks, and later in the afternoon by desultory gunshots, when from the golden triangle of wheat rabbits darted over the fresh stubble. All day long Jenny, obeying some deep instinct, prepared for the ordeal. The sun blazed over the spread harvest; the fields crackled with heat; the blue sky seemed to close upon the earth, and not even from the whole length of Trewinnard Sands was heard a solitary ripple of the tide. In the garden the claret-colored dahlias hung down their tight, uncomfortable flowers; geraniums, portulacas, nasturtiums, sunflowers and red-hot pokers burned in one furnace of bloom. Red admiral butterflies soared lazily up and down against the gray walls crumbling with heat, and from flower to flower of the scarlet salvias zigzagged the hummingbird hawkmoths. Granfa Champion, wiping with gaudy bandana his forehead, came out to plant daffodil bulbs stored in the green shadows of a cool potting shed.
"Now, you know you mustn't go digging in this sun, Mr. Champion," said reproving May.
"My cheeks are so hot as pies," declared Granfa.
"Do come and sit down with us," said Jenny.
"I believe I mustn't start tealing yet awhile," said the old man, regretfully plunging his long Cornish spade into the baked earth, from which insufficient stability the instrument fell with a thump on to the path.
"Well, how are 'ee feeling, my dear?" asked Granfa, standing before Jenny and mopping his splendid forehead. "None so frail, I hope?"
"She isn't feeling at all well. Not to-day," said May.
"That's bad," said Granfa. "That's poor news, that is."
"I feel frightened, Mr. Champion," said Jenny suddenly. Somehow this old man recalled Mr. Vergoe, rousing old impulses of childish confidence and revelation.
"Feeling frightened, are 'ee? That's bad."
"Supposing it wasn't a person at all?" said Jenny desperately. "You know, like us?"
The old man considered for a moment this morbid fancy.
"That's a wisht old thought," he said at last, "and I don't see no call for it at all. When I do teal a lily root, I don't expect to see a broccolo come bursting up and annoying me."
"But it might," argued Jenny, determined not to be convinced out of all misgiving.
"Don't encourage her, Mr. Champion," said May severely. "Tell her you think she's silly."
Jenny buried her face in her hands and began to cry. Granfa looked at her for a moment; then, advocating silence with his right forefinger, with his left thumb he indicated to May by jabbing it rapidly backwards over his shoulder that inside and upstairs to her bedroom was the best place for Jenny.
So presently she was lying on the tapestried bed in the tempered sunlight of her room, while through the house in whispers ran the news that it might be any time now. Up from downstairs sounded the restlessness of making ready. The sinking sun glowed in the heart of every vivid Brussels rose and bathed the dusty floor with orange lights. Jenny's great thought was that never again would she endure this agony, if but this once she were able to survive it. She vowed, tearing in savage emphasis the patchwork counterpane, that nothing should induce her to suffer like this a second time.
The afternoon faded tranquilly into dusk. No wind agitated a single dewy petal, and only the blackbirds with intermittent alarums broke the silence. The ripe round moon of harvest, floating mild and yellow and faintly luminous along the sky, was not yet above the hills. Mrs. Trewhella was not yet willing to despatch a summons to the doctor. Two more hours sank away. Out in the fields, marching full in the moon's face, the reapers went slowly homewards. Out in the fields they sang old songs of the earth and the grain; out in the waste the fox pricked his ears and the badger turned to listen. Down in the reeds the sedge-warbler lisped through the low ground vapors his little melody. The voices of the harvesters died away in purple glooms, and now, as if in a shell, the sea was heard lapping the sand. Through the open lattice rose the scent of the tobacco plants. There was a murmur of voices in consultation. Jenny heard a shout for Thomas, and presently horses' hoofs trotting down the farm road.
High and small and silver was the moon before she heard them coming back. The dewdrops were all diamonds, the wreathed vapors were damascened by moonlight, before she heard the grate of wheels and the click of the gate and another murmur of voices. Then the room was filled with black figures; entering lamplight seemed to magnify her pain, and Jenny knew little more until, recovering from chloroform, she perceived a candle, large as a column, burning with giant spearhead of flame and, beyond the blue and silver lattice, apprehended a fuss of movement.
"What is it?" she asked in momentary perplexity.
"’Tis a boy," said Mrs. Trewhella. "A grand lill chap."
"What's all that noise?" she murmured petulantly.
"’Tis me, my dear soul," said Mrs. Trewhella, "putting all straight as we belong."
May leaned over her sister, squeezing her hand.
"I think I shall like having a baby," said Jenny, "when we can take him out for walks. You know, just you and me, young May."