Changing Winds Part 16

"You're a terrible oul' provoker, so you are. You're just jealous, that's it, an' you're heart-feard we'll mebbe all learn how to look after the farm better nor you can!"

The old man smiled and took hold of her hand and fondled it. "You're the right wee girl," he said affectionately. "Always doin' your best to keep a man's heart up!"

"Indeed, then," she said briskly, "you gimme enough to do to keep your heart up. You're worse nor a cradleful of childher!... Here, let me wrap this shawl about your shoulders! Aren't you the oul' footer to be lettin' it slip down like that?... There now!"

He lay back in his chair while she folded the shawl about him, and smiled at her. "G.o.d content you, daughter!" he murmured.

2

"Well!" she said to Henry as they moved towards the byre.

He had sat with the farmer for a while, talking of the weather and the crops and the prospects of the harvest, and then, seeing Sheila going across the yard, he had followed her.

"Well?" she said, looking at him quizzically.

He did not know what to say, so he stood there smiling at her. Her arms were bare to the bend, and the neck of her blouse was open so that he saw her firm, brown throat.

"Well!" he replied, still smiling, and "Well?" she said again.

She went into the byre, and he followed her to the door, and stood peering into the dark interior where a sick cow lay lowing softly.

"Is that all you have to say for yourself?" Sheila called to him.

"I have a whole lot to say," he replied, "but I don't know how to say it!"

She laughed at that, and he liked the strong, quick sound of her laughter. "You're the quare wee fella," she exclaimed.

_Wee fellow!_ He flushed and straightened himself.

"I was pa.s.sing along the road," he said stiffly, "and I thought I'd come up and see your uncle!..."

"Oh!" she answered.

"Yes. My father was wondering yesterday how he was getting on, so I just thought I'd come over and see him. I suppose you're busy?"

"You suppose right!"

He moved a step or two away from the door of the byre. "Then I won't hinder you in your work," he said.

"You're not hinderin' me," she replied, coming out of the dark byre as she spoke. "It would take the quare man to hinder _me_! Where's Mr.

Marsh this mornin'?"

"Oh, somewhere!"

"I thought you an' him was always thegether. You're always about anyway!"

He felt strangely boyish while she was talking. Last night, when he had drawn her to him and had kissed her soft, moist lips, he had felt suddenly adult. While his arms were about her, he was conscious of manhood, of something new in his life, something that he had been growing to, but until that moment had not yet reached ... and now, standing in the strong sunlight and looking into her firm, laughing eyes, his manhood seemed to have receded from him, and once more he was ... a wee fellow, a schoolboy, a bit of a lad.... His vexation must have been apparent in his expression, for she said "What ails you?" to him.

"Nothing," he replied, turning away.

It was she who was making him feel schoolboyish again. She looked so capable and so a.s.sured, standing outside the byre-door, with a small crock in her hands, that he felt that she was many years older than he was, that she knew far more than he could hope to know for a long time....

She put the crock down and came close to him and took hold of his arm.

"What ails you?" she said again, peering up into his face and smiling at him.

He looked at her with sulky eyes. "You're making fun of me," he said.

She shook his arm and pushed him. "G'long with you!" she said. "A big lump of a fella like you, actin' the chile!..." She picked up the crock and handed it to him. "Here," she said, "carry that into the house, will you, an' ask me aunt Kate to give you the full of it with yella male, an' then hurry back. I'll be up in the hayloft," she added, moving off.

3

He laid the crock of yellow meal down on a wooden box in the barn, and then climbed up the ladder to the hayloft.

"Wheesht," she said, holding up her hand. "There's a hen sittin' here, an' I don't want her disturbed!" He climbed into the loft as quietly as he could. "They'll soon be out now," she went on, "the lovely wee things!... What did you come here for, the day?"

"To see you!" he answered.

"Then that was a lie about comin' to see my Uncle Matt?"

He nodded his head.

"I thought as much. Sit down here by the side of me!"

He sat down on the hay where she bade him. "Are you angry with me?" he asked, making a wisp of hay.

"What would I be angry for?"

He did not know. Last night, perhaps, when he had kissed her?

"Oh, that!" she said. "Sure, that's nothin'!"

"Nothing?"

Why, then, had she left him so suddenly? She must have known how much he had to say to her....

"Look at the time it was!" she exclaimed. "An' me havin' to get up at five an' let the cows out.... _You_ weren't up at no five, I'll bet!" He had risen at eight. "Eight!" she exclaimed. "That's no hour of the day to be risin'. If you were married to me, I'd make you skip long before that hour!"

Married to her!...

"Sheila," he whispered, taking hold of her arm.

"Well?" she said, thrusting a hay-stalk into his hair.

"I love you, Sheila!" he whispered, coming closer to her.

"Do you, indeed?" she answered.