She did not speak, though he waited for her to say something. The cow ambled up the "loanie," and Sheila, glancing at him as if she did not recognise him, passed on, following it.

"Sheila!" he called after her, but she did not answer, nor did she turn round.

"I want to speak to you," he said, going after her.

"I don't want to speak to you," she replied, without looking at him.

"But you must!..." He thrust himself in front of her, and tried to take hold of her hands, but she eluded him. She lifted the sally rod she had in her hand and threatened him with it. "I'll lash your face with this if you handle me," she said.

"All right," he answered, dropping his hands and waiting for her to beat his face with the slender branch.

She looked at him for a few moments, and then she threw the sally rod into the hedge.

"What do you want?" she asked, and the tone of her voice was quieter.

The cow, finding that it was not being followed, cropped the grass in the hedge and as they stood there, facing each other, they could hear the soft munch-munch as it tore the grass from the ground.

"What do you want?" Sheila said again.

"I want to speak to you!..."

"Well, speak away!"

But he did not know what to say to her. He thought that perhaps if he were to explain, she would forgive, but now that the opportunity to explain was open to him, he did not know what to say.

"Are you turned dummy or what?" she asked, and the cruelty in her voice was deliberate.

"Sheila," he began, hesitatingly.

"Well?"

"I'm sorry about last night!"

"What's the good of bein' sorry?..."

"I meant to stop it!..."

"I daresay," she said, laughing at him.

"I did. I did, indeed. I can't help feeling nervous. I've always been like that. I want to do things ... I try to do them ... but something inside me runs away ... that's what it is, Sheila ... it isn't me that runs away ... it's something inside me!"

"Bosh," she said.

"It's true, Sheila. My father could tell you that. I always funk things, not because I want to funk them, but because I can't help it. I'd give the world to be able to stop a horse, like that one last night, but I can't do it. I get paralysed somehow!..."

"I never heard of any one like that before," she exclaimed.

"No, I don't suppose you have. If you knew how ashamed I feel of myself, you'd feel sorry for me. I was awake the whole night!"

"Were you?"

"Yes. I kept on thinking you were angry with me and that I was a coward, and I could feel your fist in my face!..."

"I'm sorry I hit you, Henry!"

"It doesn't matter," he replied. "It served me right. And then when I did sleep, I kept on dreaming about it. Do you know, Sheila, I fell over the horse last night in the dark ... they left it lying in the road after they shot it ... and my hands slithered in the blood!..."

"Aw, the poor baste!" she said, and she began to cry. "The poor dumb baste!"

"And I kept on dreaming of that ... my hands dribbling in blood.... och!..."

He could not go on because the recollection of his dreams horrified him. They had moved to the side of the "loanie" and he mechanically stopped and plucked a long grass and began to wind it round his fingers.

"I think and think about things," he murmured at last.

She put out her hand and touched his arm. "Poor Henry," she said.

He threw the grass away and seized her hand in his.

"Then you'll forgive me?" he said eagerly.

She nodded her head.

"And you'll still be my sweetheart, won't you, and go for walks with me?..."

She withdrew her hand from his. "No, Henry," she said, "you an' me can't go courtin' no more!"

"But why?"

"Because I couldn't marry a man was afeard of things. I'd never be happy with a man like that. I'd fall out with you if you were a collie, I know I would, an' I'd be miserable if my man hadn't the pluck of any other man. I'm sorry I bate you last night, but I'd do it again if it happened another time ... an' there'd be no good in that!"

"But you said you'd marry me!..."

"Och, sure, Henry, you know well I couldn't marry you. You wouldn't be let. I'm a poor girl, an' you're a high-up lad. Whoever heard tell of the like of us marryin', except mebbe in books. I knew well we'd never marry, but I liked goin' about with you, an' listenin' to your crack, an' you kissin' me an' tellin' me the way you loved me. You've a quare nice English voice on you, an' you know it well, an' I just liked to hear it ... but didn't I know rightly, you'd never marry the like of me!"

"I will, Sheila, I will!"

"Ah, wheesht with you. What good 'ud a man like you be to a girl like me. I'll have this farm when my Uncle Matt dies, an' what use 'ud you be on it, will you tell me, you that runs away cryin' from a frightened horse?"

"You could sell the farm!..."

"Sell the farm!" she exclaimed. "Dear bless us, boy, what are you sayin' at all? Sell this farm, an' it's been in our family these generations past! There's been Hamiltons in this house for a hundred an' fifty years an' more. I wouldn't sell it for the world!"

"But I must have you, Sheila. I must marry you!"

"Why must you?"

"I just must!..."

She turned to look at the grazing cow, and then turned back to him. "That's chile's talk," she said. "You must because you must. Away on home now, an' lave me to do my work. Sure, you're not left school yet!" She left him abruptly, and walked up to the cow, slapping its flanks and shouting "Kimmup, there! Kimmup!" and the beast tossed its head, and ran forward a few paces, and then sauntered slowly up the "loanie" towards the byre.

"Good-bye, Henry!" Sheila called out when she had gone a little way.

"Will you be at the class to-night!" he shouted after her.

"I will not," she answered. "I'm not goin' to the class no more!"

He watched her as she went on up the "loanie" after the cow, hoping that she would turn again and call to him, but she did not look round. He could hear her calling to the beast, "Gwon now! Gwon out of that now!" and then he saw the cow turn into the yard, and in a moment or two Sheila followed it. He thought that she must turn to look at him then, and he was ready to wave his hand to her, but she did not look round. "Gwon now! Gwon up out of that!" was all that he heard her saying.