I could mak nowt on him--an he gan me sich a poor price.

I darn't tak a penny on 't from your aunt--noa, I darn't, Louie,--not if it wor iver so.
She'll be reet down mad when she knaws--an I'm real sorry about that bit dress o' yourn, Louie.' He stood looking down at her, his spectacles falling forward on his nose, the corners of his mouth drooping--a big ungainly culprit.
For a second or two the child was quite still, nothing but the black eyes and tossed masses of hair showing above the sheet.

Then the eyes blinked suddenly, and flinging out her hand at him with a passionate gesture, as though to push him away, she turned on her face and drew the bedclothes over her head.
'Louie!' he said--'Louie!' But she made no sign, and, at last, with a grotesquely concerned face, he went out of the room and downstairs, hanging his head.
Out of doors, he found David already at work in the cowhouse, but as surly and uncommunicative as before when he was spoken to.

That the lad had turned 'agen his wark,' and was on his way to hate the farm and all it contained, was plain even to Reuben.

Why was he so glum and silent--why didn't he speak up?
Perhaps he would, Reuben's conscience replied, if it were conveyed to him that he possessed a substantial portion of six hundred pounds! The boy knew that his uncle watched him--anxiously, as one watches something explosive and incalculable--and felt a sort of contempt for himself that nothing practical came of his own revolt and discontent.