CHAPTER XXXIV.
The elections were over. They had passed quietly enough, and Mr. Farnham was returned for our division of Sussex, as Squire Broderick had always said he would be. As far as I recollect, it was as every one had expected, and I don't even remember that any one was particularly disappointed excepting the Thornes themselves and Mr. Hoad.
He, I remember, came to see father the very next day on business, and whether it was the "business" or the Radical failure I don't know, but his face wore that expression of mean vindictiveness which I had always instinctively felt it could wear, although I had never actually seen it as I saw it that day. He was closeted some time with father in the study. I met them in the hall as they came out; I was just starting for the Manor with the basket of jelly.
"Ah, we should have won it if you had helped us," the solicitor was saying. "And I must say, Maliphant, it doesn't seem to me to be right to hold aloof when energy is required in the cause."
Father's underlip swelled portentously; it was the sign of a storm within him; but he controlled himself and did not reply.
He turned to me instead, and said: "Are you off to the Manor, Meg? Well, ask the squire if I shall come and spend an hour or two with him to-night, as he's laid up."
The disagreeable expression deepened on Hoad's face. "Ah, your friend the squire'll be in fine feather," said he to father. "It's a precious good thing for him and his friend Farnham that that smart young nephew of his didn't come down and address the meeting the other night. He's an influential chap, and he's an honest fellow; he sticks by the ship."
Father looked towards me, and said, quietly, "Well, be off, my girl."
It seemed to bring Mr. Hoad to his senses. He turned to me with that particular smile which I so much disliked, and said: "Ah, Squire Broderick is a great friend of Miss Margaret's; we all know that. It's not always the young and handsome that succeed with the fair sex, and we can't blame a lady if she should put in her oar on the side it suits her to trim the boat."
"Don't talk nonsense to my girl, Hoad, if you please," cried father, angrily. "She doesn't understand that kind of stuff."