show that John Fenwick was a man of temperament inevitably attracted
by womankind.

He murmured that she had made mountains out of mole-hills. She merely
raised his hand and kissed it. 'The women make a fool of you, John,'
she said, 'and I ought to be there to protect you--for you do love me,
you know--you do!'

And then with tears she broke down and clung to him again, in a mood
that was partly the love of wife for husband and partly an exquisite
maternity--the same feeling she gave her child. He responded with
eagerness, feeling indeed that he had won his battle.

For she lay in his arms--weak--protesting no more. The note of
anguish, of deep, incalculable foreboding, which she had shown, passed
away from her manner and words; while on his side he began to draw
pictures of the future so full of exultation and of hope that
her youth presently could but listen and believe. The sickle moon
descended behind the pikes; only the stars glimmered on the great side
of the fell, on solitary yews black upon the night, on lines of wall,
on dim, mysterious paths, old as the hills themselves, on the softly
chiding water. The May night breathed upon them, calmed them, brought
out the better self of each. They returned to the cottage like
children, hand in hand, talking of a hundred practical details,
thankful that the jarring moment had passed away, each refraining from
any word that could wound the other. Nor was it till Fenwick was sound
asleep beside her that Phoebe, replunged in loneliness and dread, gave
herself in the dawn-silence to a passion of unconquerable tears.