John Turnham's fears would never be his--
this jealous care of a transient bodily beauty. Polly was neither too
rare nor too fair for her woman's lot; and, please God, the day would
come when he would see her with a whole cluster of little ones round her
--little dark-eyed replicas of herself. She, bless her, should dandle
and cosset them to her heart's content. Her joy in them would also be
his.
Chapter IX
He sawed, planed, hammered; curly shavings dropped and there was a
pleasant smell of sawdust. Much had to be done to make the place fit to
receive Polly. A second outhouse was necessary, to hold the surplus
goods and do duty as a sleeping-room for Long Jim and Hempel: the lean-to
the pair had occupied till now was being converted into a kitchen. At
great cost and trouble, Mahony had some trees felled and brought in from
Warrenheip. With them he put up a rude fence round his backyard,
interlacing the lopped boughs from post to post, so that they formed a
thick and leafy screen. He also filled in the disused shaft that had
served as a rubbish-hole, and chose another, farther off, which would be
less malodorous in the summer heat. Finally, a substantial load of
firewood carted in, and two snakes that had made the journey in hollow
logs dispatched, Long Jim was set down to chop and split the wood into a
neat pile. Polly would need but to walk to and from the woodstack for
her firing.
Indoors he made equal revolution.
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