"Who said I was put out?"
"As if I couldn't tell by your tone! Now, just because you happen to be put out, I'm indelicate all of a sudden."
"I never said so," Dinah protested sullenly.
"Said so?" Mrs Bosenna, rising, faced her with withering scorn. "I hope you've a better sense of your position than to say such a thing. Oh, you content yourself with hinting! . . . But who owns this house and garden, I should like to know?"
Dinah, though remorseful, showed fight yet. "Then why couldn' ye take the bull by the horns an' march in by the front door?"
"Why? Because you agreed with me that to plant a two or three roses for him would be a nice attention! . . . You can't start planting roses in the dusk, at the end of an afternoon call; and, as it is, we've only just finished before twilight."
Dinah was minded to retort that, as it was, the planting had taken a long time. But she contented herself with glancing again at the house and saying evasively that the new tenant appeared to take more interest in fixtures than in flowers.
"I own," sighed Mrs Bosenna, "I thought he'd have been eager to take stock of the garden before it grew dark. Such a beautiful garden, as it is, in a small way!"
"When a man has passed his whole life at sea—"
"True," her mistress agreed. "Yet how it must enlarge the mind!
So different from farming!"