After a minute's keen observation, the miner pulled off his cap respectfully. “Thank'ee, sir! You bean't he, I see. But you be th' old Squire's son, and—I be Darset, I be!”
Another bow—the involuntary respect to the ancient county family from honest labour born upon its ancestral sod, and the man leaned exhausted against the ragged stem of one of the old vines.
“Missus,” he said, looking up hungrily—at the lady this time— “Missus, do'ee gie 'un a bit o' bread!”
Agatha, full of compassion, was eager to send the servants or take him into the kitchen, or even fetch him his dinner with her own hands. Mr. Harper interfered.
“I will bring him some food myself. Stay here, my man; don't stir hence. Remember, you have nothing to do with my father.”
There was a warning severity in the tone which annoyed Agatha. Why did her husband speak harshly to the poor miner?
Still she obeyed Mr. Harper's evident wish that she should go away; and spent the time in Elizabeth's room, telling her of this little incident.
Miss Harper listened with all the quick intelligence of her bright eyes. The only remark she made was:
“What could have led this miner to come back to Dorsetshire after our family?”
Agatha had never thought of this, indeed she did not want to think. Her heart was brimming with charity. She longed to empty it out in a torrent of benefactions, to which even Anne Valery's constant stream of good deeds appeared measured and slow. Elizabeth watched her with a strange piercing expression—Elizabeth, who from her silent nest seemed to behold all things clearer, like a spirit sitting halfway in upper air, to whose passionless wide vision distant mazes take form and proportion. Often, there was something almost supernatural in Elizabeth and her attentive eyes.