A very favourable occasion for this now seemed to offer itself, and he accordingly proceeded with an elastic step and dignified gait towards the Mowbray Arms.
At the moment he appeared in sight, the ex-housekeeper of the Park was describing to Mrs. Freeman and her daughter Sally the return of its mistress and most unwelcome master on the preceding evening.
"Why, here he comes, as sure as I live!" exclaimed Dorothy. "What in the wide world can bring him here? It must be to preachify you, Mrs. Williams."
"And that's what he shall never do again:—so step out and speak to him outside—there's a dear good woman; and if I see you can't get rid of him, I'll make my way out of the back door, and so go round and slip in again and up to my own room before he can catch me."
To facilitate this escape, Mrs. Freeman walked forth and met the reverend bridegroom just as he had reached the foot of the post from whence depended the Mowbray Arms.
"Good morning, Mrs. Freeman," he said, in the peculiar accent in which he always addressed those who were not (to use his own phrase) of his father's house,—a tone in which cold outward civility was struggling with hot internal hatred;—"Good morning, Mrs. Freeman."
"Good morning, sir," responded Mrs. Freeman with a very proper and ceremonious curtsy.
"I have called to mention to you a necessary alteration that must immediately take place on your premises. You must forthwith take down the Mowbray Arms, which have no longer any connexion with the neighbourhood; and it may be, if you conduct yourselves properly, I may permit you to substitute the Cartwright Arms."
"I believe, sir," said Mrs. Freeman in a tone rather too much approaching to indifference, "that a publican may exhibit what sign he likes, provided it be not offensive to common decency: and I think there may be a many," she added, turning away to re-enter her house, "who might object to the sign you propose, as not coming within that line."
She had made a step or two towards the door, when she turned again upon hearing the voice of the vicar raised to a very unusual pitch. He was not addressing her, however, but the boy Jem, who chanced at that moment to be entering the little rickyard with a ladder upon his shoulder.