The man’s face darkened. “Take care,” he said. “You’d better be more civil. I’ll not be contradicted by a chit of a girl.”
“And I’ll not be threatened by you,” retorted Agnes, all her blood up. “You have not the slightest right here except you were allowed by mother to come. You surely have not been here long enough to claim the place in any such way as that.”
“I don’t make my claim any such way. You haven’t a notion of who I am, I suppose.”
“You are the man whom my mother allowed to live here till she should come and take her own.”
“I am not the one who is allowed here; I am the one who belongs here, and your grandfather knew it. It was a foolish move of yours, young woman, to come out here. Better let sleeping dogs lie. Was there nobody to give you better advice?”
“I didn’t ask any. I came because father couldn’t. We have travelled away out here to get this place that my grandfather left, and we are going to have it.”
The man regarded her gloomily. “I don’t doubt you’re who you say you are,” he said at last. “Your mother was your grandfather’s only child, I believe you told me. I suppose he always told her that.”
“There was no need. She was the first-born, and no sisters nor brothers came to her.”
“Your grandfather’s papers were looked into, I suppose. There was no will?”
“No; father said no doubt he meant to make one. He had spoken of it several times, but as my mother was the only child, there seemed no need, and father said the law would give everything to mother anyhow, and it was all very plain. Grandfather left some papers in father’s hands when he last came to Carlisle, and the deed was among them.”