'He'd liefer it was me than the birds!' said Hazel. 'Wheresoever I go,
folk kill things. What for do they?'

'Things must be killed.'

'It seems like the earth's all bloody,' said Hazel. 'And it's allus the
little small uns. There! He's got a jenny-wren. Oh, dearie me! it's
like I've killed 'em; it's all along of me coming to Undern.'

'Hush!' said Reddin sharply. 'What I'm afraid of is that he'll shoot
himself, he's so damned queer.'

The last cow had sauntered to the gate before Vessons opened it and
milked them that night. Afterwards he went in with the pails, set them
on the parlour floor, and said with fury to Hazel: 'Bloody, is it?'

She owned, faintly, that it was not.

'And now,' said Vessons, turning on Reddin, 'it's notice. Notice has
been give--one month--by Andrew Vessons to John Reddin, Esquire, of
Undern.'

With tragic dignity he turned to go.

He saw neither Hazel nor Reddin, but only the swan, the yew-tree swan,
his creation, now doomed to be for ever unfinished. The generations to
come would look upon a beakless swan, and would think he had meant it
so. Tears came into his eyes--smarting, difficult tears. The room was
full of brooding misery. Reddin felt awkward and astounded.