“Thou knowest all about it, Maude.”
“I know enough, any way, to advise thee to stand by thy own heart, and to say and do what it counsels thee. Pickering is made after the meanest model of a Yorkshireman; and when a Yorkshireman turns out to be a failure, he is a ruin, and no mistake.”
“What by that? I can’t quarrel with Pickering. You may kick up a dust with your neighbour, but, sooner or later, it will settle on your own door-stone. It is years and years since I learned that lesson. And as for Pickering’s ideas, many a good squire holds the same.”
“I don’t doubt it. Whatever the Ass says, the asses believe; thou wilt find that out when thou goest to Parliament.”
“Are you really going to Parliament, Father?”
“Wouldst thou like me to go, Kate?”
“Yes, if I may go to London with you.”
“It isn’t likely I would go without thee. Did thy mother tell thee, Lord Exham has come back from Italy to sit for Gaythorne.”
“A long way to come for so little,” she answered. “Why, Father! there are only a few hovels in Gaythorne, and all the men worth anything have gone to Leeds to comb wool. Poor fellows!”
“Why dost thou say ‘poor fellows’?”