“I’m feared he is. I’d not say it if there wasn’t need. But if you see Bess afore I do—and you are more like, for you go into town oftener—do drop a word to her to be prudent.”
“Tell Elizabeth Foulkes to be prudent!” exclaimed Margaret, laughing. “Nay, that were carrying coals to Newcastle!”
“Well, and the day may come for that, if the pits there be used up. Meg, have you ne’er noted that folks oftener come to trouble for want of their chief virtue than from overdoing it?”
“Nay, Alice, nor I don’t think it, neither.”
“Well, let be!” said Alice, shifting the basket to her other arm. “Them that lives ’ll see it.”
“But what mean you touching Mistress Amy! You said you were feared she’d make trouble for Bess.”
“Ay, I am: but that’s another matter. We’ve fault-found enough for one even. Who be them two afore us?”
“What, those bits of children? Why, they’re two of Jack Johnson’s, of Thorpe.”
“They look as if they’d got too much to carry,” said Alice, as they came up to the children. They were now about half way to Bentley.
The younger, a boy of about six, held one ear of a large jar full of meal, and the other was carried by his sister, whose apparent age was eight. They were plodding slowly along, as if afraid of spilling their meal, for the jar was pretty full.