"I think it is something in myself," she said presently; "something a
little wrong that I'm dreadfully tired of. Always men. Out here a Howat
Penny, just like any fribble about the Court. God, I'd like to be that
girl across the road, in the barnyard." He was back at the fire again
when Gilbert Penny entered the room. The latter dropped a palm on
Howat's shoulder.

"Schwar says the last sow metal was faulty," he declared; "the
Furnace'll need some attention with Abner Forsythe deeper in the
Provincial affairs. Splendid thing David's back. Look for a lot from
David." Howat hoped desperately that Ludowika would not leave, go to her
room, while his father was talking. "David says you have an
understanding, will do great things. I hope so. I hope so. I won't damn
him as an example but he will do you no harm. That is, if he touches
your confounded person at all. A black Penny, Mrs. Winscombe," he said,
turning to the figure spread in pale silk on the sofa. "Fortunate for
you to have no such confounded, stubborn lot on your hands. Although,"
he added laughingly, "Felix Winscombe's no broken reed. But this boy of
mine--you might think he had been run out of Shadrach," he tapped a
finger on Howat's back. "Not like those fellows about the Court, anyway.
They tell me he'll go fifty miles through the woods in a day. Now if we
could only keep that at the iron trade--"

His father went on insufferably, without end. Howat withdrew stiffly
from the other's touch. Irresistibly he drifted back, back to Ludowika.
She had not moved; her bent hand seemed dislocated. An immense
tenderness for her overwhelmed him; his sheer passion vapourized into a
poignant sweetness of solicitous feeling. He was protective; his jaw set
rigidly, he enveloped her in an angry barrier from all the world. He had