In a rage one day, after trying to work on the board, and failing, so that his belly was a flame of nausea, he chopped up the whole panel and put it on the fire. She did not know. He went about for some days very quiet and subdued after it.
“ Where is the Adam and Eve board?” she asked him.
“ Burnt.”
She looked at him.
“ But your carving?”
“ I burned it.”
“ When?”
She did not believe him.
“ On Friday night.”
“ When I was at the Marsh?”
“ Yes.”
She said no more.
Then, when he had gone to work, she wept for a whole day, and was much chastened in spirit. So that a new, fragile flame of love came out of the ashes of this last pain.
Directly, it occurred to her that she was with child. There was a great trembling of wonder and anticipation through her soul. She want
