trying different ideas on him.

At last dinner was over, and tea; the tea things were washed, and the
long-neglected fancy work brought out. A clock in the passage struck
the hour when, of late, after an exhilirating verbal skirmish with the
anxious Denah, she had set out for the village and Rawson-Clew.

She did not pretend to herself that she did not enjoy that too, she
did immensely; there was a breath from the outside world in it; there
was sometimes the inspiring clash of wits, of steel on steel, always
the charm of educated intercourse and quick comprehension. To-night
there was nothing; no exercise to stir the blood, no solitude to
stimulate the imagination, no effort of talk or understanding to rouse
the mind. Nothing but to sit at work, giving one-eighth of attention
to talk with Mevrouw--more was not needed, and the rest to the blue
daffodils that lay securely locked up in a place only too well known.

Evening darkened, grey and dripping, to-night, supper-getting time
came, and the hour for locking up the barns. Mijnheer, snuffling and
wheezing a good deal, put on a coat, a mackintosh, a comforter, a pair
of boots and a pair of galoshes; took an umbrella, the lantern, a
great bunch of keys, and went out. Julia watched him go, and said
nothing; she had been the rounds a good many times with Joost now; the
family had talked about it more than once, and about her bravery with
regard to rats and robbers. Neither of the old people would have been
surprised if she had volunteered to go in place of Mijnheer, even if
his cold had not offered a reason for such a thing. But she did not do
it; he went alone, and the blue daffodil bulbs lay snug in their
locked place.