“Well, the woman will be better off,” said another of a more deliberative turn.  “For seafaring natures be very good shelter for shorn lambs, and the man do seem to have plenty of money, which is what she’s not been used to lately, by all showings.”

“Mark me—­I’ll not go after her!” said the trusser, returning doggedly to his seat.  “Let her go!  If she’s up to such vagaries she must suffer for ’em.  She’d no business to take the maid—­’tis my maid; and if it were the doing again she shouldn’t have her!”

Perhaps from some little sense of having countenanced an indefensible proceeding, perhaps because it was late, the customers thinned away from the tent shortly after this episode.  The man stretched his elbows forward on the table leant his face upon his arms, and soon began to snore.  The furmity seller decided to close for the night, and after seeing the rum-bottles, milk, corn, raisins, etc., that remained on hand, loaded into the cart, came to where the man reclined.  She shook him, but could not wake him.  As the tent was not to be struck that night, the fair continuing for two or three days, she decided to let the sleeper, who was obviously no tramp, stay where he was, and his basket with him.  Extinguishing the last candle, and lowering the flap of the tent, she left it, and drove away.

2.

The morning sun was streaming through the crevices of the canvas when the man awoke.  A warm glow pervaded the whole atmosphere of the marquee, and a single big blue fly buzzed musically round and round it.  Besides the buzz of the fly there was not a sound.  He looked about—­at the benches—­at the table supported by trestles—­at his basket of tools—­at the stove where the furmity had been boiled—­at the empty basins—­at some shed grains of wheat—­at the corks which dotted the grassy floor.  Among the odds and ends he discerned a little shining object, and picked it up.  It was his wife’s ring.

A confused picture of the events of the previous evening seemed to come back to him, and he thrust his hand into his breast-pocket.  A rustling revealed the sailor’s bank-notes thrust carelessly in.

This second verification of his dim memories was enough; he knew now they were not dreams.  He remained seated, looking on the ground for some time.  “I must get out of this as soon as I can,” he said deliberately at last, with the air of one who could not catch his thoughts without pronouncing them.  “She’s gone—­to be sure she is—­gone with that sailor who bought her, and little Elizabeth-Jane.  We walked here, and I had the furmity, and rum in it—­and sold her.  Yes, that’s what’s happened and here am I. Now, what am I to do—­am I sober enough to walk, I wonder?” He stood up, found that he was in fairly good condition for progress, unencumbered.  Next he shouldered his tool basket, and found he could carry it.  Then lifting the tent door he emerged into the open air.