`Do you mind pushing her home, Mellors!' he said in a cool superior tone. `I hope I have said nothing to offend you,' he added, in a tone of dislike.
`Nothing at all, Sir Clifford! Do you want me to push that chair?'
`If you please.'
The man stepped up to it: but this time it was without effect. The brake was jammed. They poked and pulled, and the keeper took off his gun and his coat once more. And now Clifford said never a word. At last the keeper heaved the back of the chair off the ground and, with an instantaneous push of his foot, tried to loosen the wheels. He failed, the chair sank. Clifford was clutching the sides. The man gasped with the weight.
`Don't do it!' cried Connie to him.
`If you'll pull the wheel that way, so!' he said to her, showing her how.
`No! You mustn't lift it! You'll strain yourself,' she said, flushed now with anger.
But he looked into her eyes and nodded. And she had to go and take hold of the wheel, ready. He heaved and she tugged, and the chair reeled.
`For God's sake!' cried Clifford in terror.
But it was all right, and the brake was off. The keeper put a stone under the wheel, and went to sit on the bank, his heart beat and his face white with the effort, semi-conscious.
Connie looked at him, and almost cried with anger. There was a pause and a dead silence. She saw his hands trembling on his thighs.
`Have you hurt yourself?' she asked, going to him.
`No. No!' He turned away almost angrily.
There was dead silence. The back of Clifford's fair head did not move. Even the dog stood motionless. The sky had clouded over.
At last he sighed, and blew his nose on his red handkerchief.
`That pneumonia took a lot out of me,' he said.
No one answered. Connie calculated the amount of strength it must have taken to heave up that chair and the bulky Clifford: too much, far too much! If it hadn't killed him!
He rose, and again picked up his coat, slinging it through the handle of the chair.
`Are you ready, then, Sir Clifford?'
`When you are!'
He stooped and took out the scotch, then put his weight against the chair. He was paler than Connie had ever seen him: and more absent. Clifford was a heavy man: and the hill was steep. Connie stepped to the keeper's side.
`I'm going to push too!' she said.