“I was doubly surprised to hear of his departure, because it was quite other news I’d looked for. Folk had it he was getting ready to marry and settle down, and I thought the lady in luck, whoever she might be. I was misinformed, I suppose? Strange how these tales get round!”
A certain uneasiness became apparent in both Michael and Rowly at this, but Mrs. Dockeray never turned a hair.
“Ay, well, courtin’ he might be, like enough, but it isn’t every lass would look at Lup, as I mentioned a minute ago, for all he’s a good enough lad and steady as yon shuppon. He’s not everybody’s choice in these days o’ lettering and figuring. There’s a many as’ll seek to look higher than just poor Lup Whinnerah!”
She fixed him again, and he nodded assent, seeing that it was expected of him; and then, from her post at the window, where she had moved at the end of the meal, he met Francey’s clear gaze. She stood half-turned to the casement and the stretch of sand beyond, her pale cheek to the brilliant geraniums on the wide ledge, and in her eyes, as they rested on his, something of scorn and yet of wounded appeal. He felt the blood rise to his face as he looked, conscious of having outraged both her feelings and his own good taste. The type he understood would have taken him in jest, or retreated from the room in dudgeon; not have remained without retort, gently contemptuous and quietly hurt. He changed the subject abruptly, wishing the Whinnerahs and their affairs at Jericho.
Lup’s name dropped like a stone, but the question of matrimony still hung in the air, for Michael himself came back to it after a lengthy discussion upon the late danger of plague from Irish cattle.
“Ay, there’s many a knock-down blow lying in wait for the poor farmer!” he observed, shaking his head over a new and harrowing tale. “But it’s a decent enough life for them as is framed for it and knows how to take it standing. It’s done well enough by me. I’ve a fairish farm and a just landlord, and the sort of missis a man’ll be put about to part with when the time comes for his last ride to church!” He looked across at his wife with a mild twinkle. “Not but what she’s a rough side to her tongue, and a mighty short stock o’ patience for them as doesn’t see same ways as herself;—but there’s only two sorts o’ wives, Mr. Lancaster—them as a man’s fain to be shot of, an’ them as he’d be right fain to be shot for—an’ yon last’s my missis, sir, and a good bit over!”
Francey left the window, and laid her hands on his shoulders for a moment, her face lightly smiling and tender. Then she was gone from the room, while Mrs. Dockeray, with the suspicion of a shake in her voice, defended her character for patience.
“Eh, well, I reckon we’re as easy as most!” she admitted at last with her cheerful laugh. “You’d do no harm to take copy from us, Mr. Lancaster. We’ve been looking for you to get wed, any time these last ten years!”
Lanty was used to the suggestion, and repudiated it without embarrassment.
“I’m not a marrying man, I doubt!” he answered; and, even as he spoke, felt a surge of envy sweep over him at the picture of mutual need before him. “Any more than Lup!” he added, with meaning, and there came another pause, during which Rowly slipped out after his sister.