"I didn't expect you back so soon, my dear," he said to the old woman.
"And I didn't expect to be home so soon," she answered, "and, what's more, I came too soon for my peace, for if I hadn't gone up Church Lane when I did, I shouldn't have seen a very sad sight."
Amelia had worn well. She was upright and stout and strong—the youngest of the party, as Adam always declared. The men resembled each other. Samuel was but a few years older than his brother and Adam stood to him for divinity. He echoed his opinions and bestowed upon him absolute trust. Nothing his younger brother could do was wrong. Sammy's mental eccentricities were considered quite harmless and they had seldom as yet made him a danger to the community. If he ever displayed a spark of passion, it was at any adverse criticism of Adam, and this weakness on his part—once actually manifested, when he fell tooth and nail upon another labourer for laughing at his brother over some trifle—was now respected. In person Samuel appeared a larger edition of Adam, but of gaunt expression and already grey. He was very strong and laboured like a horse. Work kept his mind sweet.
"And what might you have seen to shock you, Aunt?" asked the master of Shipley.
"A sorry sight," she answered. "You mind poor Miss Marydrew's famous hat with the red squirrel's tail? It was a well-known feature—a proper landmark round about; and to-day I've seen it on another woman's head, and you might have knocked me down with a feather. That any female could have the front to flaunt that well-known trophy! And such a female! Sarah Saunders if you please. Properly indecent I call it."
"Her sale fetched very good prices," said Adam. "Old William kept a few of the best things for his house; but they say he's cleared something better than sixty pounds by it."
"He oughtn't to have sold her clothes, and I've told him so," answered Amelia. "Clothes are sacred to the wearer in my opinion, and I'd so soon have seen Mercy's ghost as her hat on that wicked head. It won't bring no luck to anybody concerned."
Adam told how Barton Gill was under notice, and his aunt thought it a hard thing. Samuel waited to hear his brother's opinion, and echoed it.
"Gill's worn out and did ought to make room for a younger man," he said.
He spoke very slowly in a very deep voice.