“Evening, Miss Mary,” said the visitor briskly. “Nice growing weather. Father at home?”
“Yes, I’m at home. Want me, Daniel Barnett?”
“Well, yes, Mr Ellis, sir, there’s a little bit o’ business I want to see you about. I ought to have asked you this morning and down at the gardens, but somehow I’ve always got such a lot of things on my mind there that a lot of ’em slip out again.”
“Come in then, come in then,” said Ellis.
“Not if it’s disturbing you, sir,” protested the visitor. “Say the word, and I’ll go and come up another evening. I don’t mind a walk, Miss Mary,” he added, in a confidential way.
“Business, business, Daniel Barnett! And there’s nothing like getting it over,” said Ellis, as, after a good deal of preliminary shoe-rubbing, Barnett stepped to the door of the sitting-room, and then stopped short in a very apologetic way.
“Why, you’re just going to supper. I’d best come up to-morrow night.”
James Ellis felt in the best of humours, and he smiled.
“Well,” he said, “if you come to-morrow evening, I suppose I shall have some supper then. Sit down, man, and out with it.”
“Oh, thank you, Mr Ellis, and with many apologies to you, Mrs Ellis, ma’am, and to you too, Miss Mary.”