At the beginning of her venture Jeckie had spent all her energies on the business part of her establishment, and had laid out very little money on the furnishing of the private rooms. A living room for meals, bedrooms for herself and Rushie and their father, had seemed to her sufficient for first needs; additions could come later, if the business prospered. The business had prospered, and there came a time when she determined to have at least a parlour into which the better class of customers could be shown if they wanted to see her, as they sometimes did, in private. Accordingly, she gave orders to the best firm of furniture dealers in Sicaster to fit up a room at the side of the house in handsome, if solid, style, having previously had it, and a lobby adjoining it, painted and decorated in corresponding manner. The door of the lobby opened on a little side garden; she ordered it to be painted a rich dark green, and had it fitted with a fine brass knocker which one of the shop-boys kept so constantly polished that its refulgence exceeded that of the golden teapot at the front of the house. It was to this door that George Grice stole, and at this knocker that he sounded his summons, and the time was half-past nine at night.

Jeckie—alone, for Farnish had already retired—wondered who it could be that came knocking there at that late hour. She picked up a hand-lamp and went round to the lobby and opened the door; the light of the lamp fell full on George Grice's round face, and on a certain sheepish and furtive look in his eyes. He lifted his slouched straw hat, and even smiled faintly, but Jeckie frowned in ominous fashion.

"What do you want?" she demanded in her least gracious manner. She had never heard Grice's voice since the afternoon, now long since, on which he had ridden away from Applecroft, turning a deaf ear to her prayers, but she remembered it well enough, and she knew that there was a new note in it when he spoke, a note of something very like meekness, if not of positive humility.

"I could like a word or two wi' you, if you please," said Grice. "A word i' private."

Jeckie knew from the very tone that this man who had once thrown her aside like an old glove, and whom she had fought with the fierceness and tenacity of a tiger, had come to acknowledge himself defeated. Without a word she motioned him to enter, closed the door, led him into the new parlour, lighted a handsome standard lamp that stood on the table, and pointing him to a chair, took one herself and stared at him.

"Well?" she said.

Grice drew out a big handkerchief and mopped his bald head; it was an old trick of his, well remembered by Jeckie, whenever he was moved or excited.

"I made a mistake i' your case," he answered, almost dully. "I—I didn't know it at the time, but I know it now—to my cost."

"Aye, because I've taught you to know it!" said Jeckie. "I've bested you!" Grice looked at her, furtively. He had some knowledge of human nature, and he suddenly realised the woman's hard, determined spirit.

"If I'd ha' known," he burst out suddenly, "what make of woman you are, I'd ha' taken good care that things turned out different! If you'd married our Albert—aye, things would indeed ha' been different! But I went on t'wrong side o' t'road—and he married that niece o' mine, 'at's now made him turn agen' his own father, and I'm left there—alone!"

"Your own fault!" said Jeckie. "Who made your bed but yourself?"

"That makes it no better," replied Grice. "Nay, it makes it worse! I've borne more nor I ever expected to bear. This—(he waved his hand around as if to include his rival's establishment and trade)—this is t'least of it. You fought me fair and square, no doubt; and I'm beaten. But there's a thing I can suggest, even at this stage."

"What?" demanded Jeckie, who was watching him keenly. "What?"

Grice put both hands on his knees and bent forward to her.

"I'm still a well-to-do man," he said, in a low, terse voice. "Accordin' to some standards, I'm a rich man. I had a reckonin' up t'other night o' what I were worth. If I'd to die now I should cut up well. You'd be surprised. And I shan't leave a penny to my son! My son, Albert Grice—not a penny!"

Jeckie continued to stare at him; herself silent, her face fixed. She saw that her beaten rival had still a lot more to say, and that left to himself he would say it.

"Not one penny to him!" continued Grice with emphasis. "For why? I'll not say 'at if he were a single man or a widow man I shouldn't. But he's wed and to my niece, and after what I've experienced at her hands I'll take care 'at she handles no more money o' mine. It were her 'at forced Albert to dissolve partnership wi' me. I had to pay him out wi' a lot o' money. But they'll never see another penny of what I've got! An' as I said just now, I'm worth, first and last, a good deal."

Jeckie suddenly opened her tightly-shut lips.

"How much?" she asked quietly.

Grice gave her a quick look; from her face his eyes wandered to the door of the parlour, which Jeckie had left open. He suddenly rose from his chair, tiptoed across the floor, and looked out into the lobby.

"There isn't a soul in the house but Farnish, and he's fast asleep, t'other side of the shop," said Jeckie, laconically. "But you can shut the door if you like."

Grice shut the door, slid back to his chair, and once more looked at her.

"Five and twenty thousand pound, at least," he said in a whisper. "One thing and another, five-and-twenty thousand pound!"

Jeckie watched him steadily through another period of silence.

"What did you come here for?" she suddenly demanded. "It wasn't for naught, I'll be bound! You'd an idea in your head!"

Grice leaned an elbow on the table, and began to tap the smart cloth with his thick fingers.

"An idea, aye—a suggestion," he answered, his small eyes still set on the woman who sat bolt upright before him. "And I'll put it to you, Jecholiah, for I know—and I wish I'd known sooner!—'at you're as keen on brass as what I've always been. It's this here, i' one word—marriage!"

Jeckie heard, without moving a muscle of her face nor relaxing the steady stare of her eyes.

"You an' me," she said in a low voice. "You and me—that's what you mean, Grice?"

"Me an' you," asserted Grice, nodding his bald head. "Me an' you—that is what I mean, and I've thought it out careful. Look here! I'm a certain age, but I'm a strong and well-preserved man, and worth at least—only at least, mind you—five-and-twenty thousand pound. Now then, this here business o' yours—and well you've conducted it!—is worth a lot already, goodwill, stock i' hand, and so on. Mine's still worth a good deal—old established, and I've one trade 'at you haven't touched—hay and corn merchant—'at's as good as ever. Now I haven't counted my businesses in that five-and-twenty thousand pound. An', do you see, supposin' you and me were to sell our businesses to a limited liability company, I know how and where they could be sold, and if you want to know, to one o' them firms o' that sort 'at's takin' over village businesses and transformin' 'em into big general stores. If, I say, we were to do that, d'ye see what a lot o' money we should have between us? And—you'll already have saved a good deal, I know!"

"Well, and what then?" asked Jeckie. There was not a trace of anything but hard business dealing in her voice, and her face was as fixed as ever. "What then, Grice?"

Grice put his head on one side, and seemed to be making some mental reflections.

"Taking one thing with another," he said, "what I have, what I can get for my business; what you have, what you can get for this place, I reckon we should be uncommon well off. We'd marry, and take a nice house, wherever you like, and keep a smart trap and horse."

"Smarter than your Albert's?" interrupted Jeckie with a sneer so faint that Grice failed to see it. "What?"

"Aye, a deal!" asserted Grice. "And we'd show 'em how to do it! Albert'll none ever touch a penny o' mine, now! Say the word, and it comes off, and I'll make a will i' your favour as soon as we're wed! What say you?"

Jeckie, still upright and rigid, sat staring at him until he thought she would never speak. Suddenly she rose, moved to the door, and beckoned him.

"Come here, Grice!" she said.

Grice rose and followed her round the end of the lobby into a passage which led to the shop. She opened a door, lighted a lamp, and, standing in the middle of the place, pointed round the heavily-stacked shelves and counters.

"You want to know what I say, Grice?" she said in low, incisive tones that made the old man's ears tingle. "I say this! Did ye ever see your shop stocked like mine, did you ever do as much trade as I'm doing, did you ever take as much brass over your counter in a fortnight as I take in a week? Never! An' I started all this wi' your money—it was your money that gave me my chance o' revenge. An' when I got that chance I said to myself that I'd never rest, body or soul, till I'd seen your shutters come down, and I never will! Go home!" she concluded, moving swiftly across the shop, and throwing open the street door. "Go home!—I'd as lief think o' marryin' the devil himself as o' weddin' a man like you—I shall see you pull your shutters down yet, and—I shall ha' done it!"

Grice went out into the night without a word, and Jeckie stood in her doorway and watched him march heavily across the road. When he had disappeared within his own door, she closed hers, picked up a couple of sweet biscuits out of an open box as she crossed the shop, and went upstairs, munching them contentedly. And not even the delight of revenge kept her from sleep.

There were other men in Savilestowe who had eyes on Jeckie Farnish with a view to marriage. In spite of her strenuous pursuit of money she kept her good looks; continuous work, indeed, seemed to improve them, and if there was a certain hardness about her she remained the handsomest woman in the village. And not very long after her dramatic dismissal of the old grocer she was brought face to face for the second time with the necessity of making a decision. Calling on Stubley one day to pay her rent, the farmer, after giving her a receipt, turned round from the old bureau at which he had written it, and, leaning back in his elbow chair, gazed at her critically. He was a fine-looking, well-preserved man, a bachelor, more than comfortably off, and something in his eyes brought the colour to his tenant's cheeks. For one second she forgot her hardness and her ambitions and felt, rather than remembered, that she was a woman.

"Well, mi lass!" said Stubley. "And how long's this to go on?"

"How long's what to go on?" asked Jeckie.

"All this tewin' and toilin' and scrattin' after brass?" he said, with a half-amused, half-cynical laugh. "You've been at it a good while now, and you've about done what ye set out to do. Grice'll none keep his shutters up much longer. They say his takings have fallen to naught."

"I know they have," assented Jeckie with a flash of her keen eyes. "He's scarce any trade left."

"Aye, and you have it all, and I'll lay aught you've already made a nice little fortune for yourself!" continued Stubley. "So—why go on? What's the use of wasting your life, a handsome woman like you? There's something else in life than all this money-making, you know, lass. Sell your business—and live a bit!"

"Live a bit?" she said. "I—I don't know what you mean?"

Stubley waved his hand towards the window. There was a beautiful and well-kept garden outside, and beyond it a wide stretch of equally well-kept land. And Jeckie knew what the gesture meant.

"You know me," he said quietly. "Here's t'best farm-house and t'best farm in all this countryside. There's naught wanting here, mi lass—it's plenty ... and peace. And there's no mistress to it, and naught to follow me, neither lad nor lass. Say the word, and get rid o' yon shop, and I'll marry you whenever you like. And—you'd never regret it."

Jeckie stood up, trembling in spite of her strength. She thought of the hard, grinding, sordid, unlovely life which she was living in the pursuit of money, and then of what might be as mistress of that fine old farm and wife of an honest, good-natured, dependable man. But as she thought, recollection came back to her—a recollection which was with her day and night. She saw herself standing in the empty, stockless fold at Applecroft, watching George Grice drive away, deaf to her entreaties for help. The old demon of hatred and determination for revenge, and the lust for money and power which had sprung from his workings, rose up again and conquered her.

"No," she said, turning away. "I can't! I'm obliged to you, Mr. Stubley—you're a straight man, and you mean well. But—I can't do it! I've set myself to a certain thing, and I must go on—I can't stop now!"

"What certain thing, mi lass?" asked Stubley. "What're you aimin' at?"

Jeckie looked round her, at the old furniture, the old pictures and framed samplers on the walls of the farm-house parlour, and from them to Stubley, and her eyes grew deep and sombre.

"I'm going to be the richest woman in all these parts!" she whispered. "I've set my mind to it, and it's got to be. I've no time to think of men—I'm after money—money!"

Then she turned and went swiftly out, leaving the farmer staring after her with wonder in his eyes. And he shook his head as he picked up the cheque which she had just given him and locked it in his bureau. He was thinking of the times when Jeckie Farnish could not have put her name to a cheque for a penny piece. But now—

There was yet one more man who wanted to marry the determined, money-grubbing woman. Bartle, who had seen Jeckie Farnish every day of his life since he had first come, seeking a job, to her father's door, a lad of fifteen, and who had served her like a faithful dog from the beginning of her big venture, came to feel that with him it was either going to be all or nothing. He had developed into a fine, handsome fellow, whose steadiness was a by-word in the village; in looks and character he was a man that any woman might well have been proud of. And one Sunday, having occasion to see Jeckie about some business of the ensuing morning, he suddenly spoke straight out, as he and she stood among the flowers in her garden.

"Missis!" he said, his bronzed cheeks taking on a deep blush. "There's a word I mun either say or burst—I cannot hold it longer! I been i' love wi' you ever sin I were a lad, and you a lass, and it grows waur and waur! Will you wed me?—for if you weern't missis, I mun go!"

Jeckie looked at him, and knew the reality of what he had said. And for a moment she felt something remind her that she was a woman—but in the next she had steeled herself.

"It's no good, lad!" she said softly. "No good! Put it away from you."

Bartle turned white as his Sunday shirt, but he stood erect.

"Then you mun let me go, missis, and at once," he said huskily. "I've saved money, and I'll go a long way off—to this here Canada 'at they talk about. But go I will!"

He came to say good-bye to her three days later, and Jeckie put a hundred pounds in banknotes into his hand. It was the only deed of its sort that she ever wanted to do, but Bartle would have none of it. His eyes looked another appeal as he said his farewell, and Jeckie shook her head and let him go. And so he went, white-faced and dry-eyed, and with him went the last chance of redemption that Jeckie Farnish ever had. She had sold herself by then, body and soul, to Mammon.