At this moment Granfa Champion himself appeared, his countenance flushed with conquest, his eyes shining in a limpid blue, his snow-white hair like spindrift round his face.
"Come in, you Granfa," his nephew invited.
"Is the maids come?" he asked.
"Ess, ess, here they are sitting down waiting for 'ee."
Mr. Champion advanced with a fine stateliness and nobility of welcome. Indeed, shy as she was, his entrance tempted Jenny to rise from her chair.
"Come, leave me look at 'ee," said Granfa, placing his hands on her shoulders.
"Keep quiet, uncle," said Mrs. Trewhella. "You'll make her fire up."
"Ah, nonsense," contradicted the old man. "That's nothing. I do dearly love to see maids' cheeks in a blush. Wish you well, my lovely," he added, clasping Jenny's hands. "I'm terrible hurried I wasn't here to give 'ee a welcome by the door."
Jenny liked this old man, who for the exile from a distant country by his age and dignity and sweetness conjured a few tears of home. The supper, a late meal for such a household, went its course at a fair speed; for they were all anxious to be off to bed with the prospect of work in the windy November dawn. Very soon they all vanished through the out-house door, and Granfa, with lighted candle, a hot brick wrapped in flannel under his arm, twinkled slowly up to bed through the hollow staircase. The rest of them were left alone in a silence. It was ten o'clock, and the fire was already paling behind the fluted bars of the slab.
"Well, I suppose you're thinking of bed?" suggested Mrs. Trewhella.