It emphasized the pettiness of her victory. Even at that
moment, she realized that it was the poorer part of her which had
resented attack on a citadel which should be impregnable as time
itself. Just then Enoch stepped into the kitchen behind her, and his
voice jarred upon her tingling nerves.
"Well," said he, more jovially than he was wont to speak, "I guess I've
made a good trade for ye. Company gone? Come here an' se' down while I
eat, an' I'll tell ye all about it."
Amelia turned about and walked slowly up to him, by no volition of her
conscious self. Again love, that august creature, veiled itself in an
unjust anger, because it was love and nothing else.
"You've made a good bargain, have you?" she repeated. "You've sold my
cows, an' had 'em drove off the place without if or but. That's what
you call a good bargain!" Her voice frightened her. It amazed the man
who heard. These two middle-aged people were waking up to passions
neither had felt in youth. Life was strong in them because love was
there.
"Why, 'Melia!" said the man. "Why, 'Melia!"
Amelia was hurried on before the wind of her destiny. Her voice grew
sharper. Little white stripes, like the lashes from a whip, showed
themselves on her cheeks.
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