His ideal woman--the woman of the early Victorian
period--was submissive and clinging. He was perfectly assured that
she would have borne her wrongs, and even her mother's wrongs, with
humility. Meekness had always seemed to him the becoming mental and
facial expression for the sex; and that a woman should resent appeared
almost as indelicate as that she should propose.
When supper was over, and Reuben had settled to his pipe, with the old
hound at his feet, Molly took down a bunch of keys from a nail in the
wall, and lit a lantern with a taper which she selected from a china
vase on the mantelpiece. Once outside she walked a little ahead of Gay
and the yellow blaze of the lantern flitted like a luminous bird over
the flagged walk bordered by gooseberry bushes. Between the stones,
which were hollowed by the tread of generations, nature had embroidered
the bare places with delicate patterns of moss.
At the kitchen the girl stopped to summon Patsey, the maid, who was
discovered roasting an apple at the end of a long string before the
logs.
"I am going to the big house. Come and make up the bed in the blue
room," Gay heard through the door.
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