Ishmael to dance with you. He's going to be master of the feast, and
perhaps if you ask him very nicely he'll dance with you just once."

This view of Ishmael as a person of importance was a new one to
Phoebe, and she looked at him as though appraising him afresh.

"I don't ask no chaps to dance wi' I," she announced loftily. "Faëther's
just comen' to see you, Da Boase."

She wriggled her sleek little otter-like head under his arm and slipped
past him as she spoke. Then:

"Like to see the pigs?" she asked Ishmael carelessly. "Da ringed 'en the
marnen'."

"Don't mind if I do," answered Ishmael, still scraping the gravel.

"Naden't come ef 'ee don't want to more'n thet!" retorted Phoebe, "and
I could have shown 'ee where the old pig was killed. There's been a dark
place on the stones ever since. I saw it killed, I did, Ishmael Ruan. I
saw Da stick in the knife and the blood come all out, I ded!"

"So 'a ded, my 'andsome, so 'a ded!" applauded the miller, whose big
form, powdery white, had appeared in the passage.

The Parson felt decidedly sick. He was country-born himself, and, being
no mere dreamer of dreams, realised that it was as well that country
people should not flinch at the less poetic side of their lives, but
this callousness struck him as horrible in a young child like Phoebe.
Yet as he saw Ishmael wince he regretted the very sensibility in the