and for getting all the possible work out of others. If no one had gone
short under her roof, neither had anyone gone idle--if the tea was
strong and the butter was thick and there was always prime bacon for
breakfast on Sundays, so was there also a great clatter on the stairs at
five o'clock each morning, a rattle of brooms and hiss and slop of
scrubbing-brushes--and the mistress with clogs on her feet and her
father's coat over her gown, poking her head into the maids' room to see
if they were up, hurrying the men over their snacks, shouting commands
across the yard, into the barns or into the kitchen, and seemingly
omnipresent to those slackers who paused to rest or chat or "put their
feet up."

That time had scarred her a little--put some lines into the corners of
her eyes and straightened the curling corners of her mouth, but it had
also heightened the rich healthy colour on her cheeks, enlarged her fine
girth, her strength of shoulder and depth of bosom. She did not look any
older, because she was so superbly healthy and superbly proud. She knew
that the neighbours were impressed by Ansdore's thriving, when they had
foretold its downfall under her sway.... She had vindicated her place in
her father's shoes, and best of all, she had expiated her folly in the
matter of Socknersh, and restored her credit not only in the bar of the
Woolpack but in her own eyes.




§2

One afternoon, soon after Ellen had gone back to school for her second
year, when Joanna was making plum jam in the kitchen, and getting very