"Eh, no; not that I ever saw," she answered at length. "He was fond of
her--very fond; but he was a wilful one, and he beat her sometimes when
he got tired of being on land. But women must not mind that, you know, my
dear, if only a man's heart is right. Things fret them, and then they
belabor what they love best; it is a way they have."
"But she speaks of him as of an angel nearly!" said Bebee, bewildered.
The old woman took up her flagon, with a smile flitting across her wintry
face.
"Ay, dear; when the frost kills your brave rose-bush, root and bud,
do you think of the thorns that pricked you, or only of the fair,
sweet-smelling things that flowered all your summer?"
Bebee went away thoughtfully out of the old crazy water-washed house by
the quay; life seemed growing very strange and intricate and knotted
about her, like the threads of lace that a bad fairy has entangled in the
night.
CHAPTER X.
Her stranger from Rubes' land was a great man in a certain world. He had
become great when young, which is perhaps a misfortune. It indisposes men
to be great at their maturity.
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