Mrs. Cragg sat at the other end of the table, in a loose gown which could not be described as clean, while her hair was twisted up and still in curling-pins. The effect was not becoming. She jerked up her head, and said:
"I should think you'd wasted time enough already over those Dales. How much do you suppose that house cost you to build?"
Cragg intimated that all the bills were not in yet.
"And how much do you imagine you'll ever make by it?"
"A good deal less than nothing, I'm afraid."
"And that's what you call 'business,' I suppose?"
"I call it one of the mistakes which the best of business men may make, once in a way. Nobody thought of any old mine being thereabouts."
"Somebody ought to have thought of it."
"I don't know who would. The old verger fancies now that he can remember hearing of one which was closed nearly seventy years ago, but he had forgotten all about it—till this happened."
"If you had taken the trouble to make proper inquiries before building, he would have remembered, fast enough. That's just your way of doing things."