“Gettin’ o’ me!” echoed Sim. “Not he. He tried it on wi’ me as soon as we met; but I wrastled with him by word o’ mouth, and he went down like a stone.”
“Did he though, Sim?”
“Ay, lad. Yon parson’s all very well, but he’s fra London, and he’ll hev to get up pretty early to get over a Lincoln man, eh?”
“Ay,” said the landlord; “but he ain’t so bad nayther. A came here and sat down just like a christian, and talked to the missus and played wi’ the bairns for long enough.”
“Did he though,” said Sim. “Hey, lad, but that’s his artfulness. He wants to get the whip hand o’ thee.”
“I dunno ’bout that,” said the landlord, who eked out his income from the publican business with a little farming. “I thowt so at first, and expected he’d want to read a chapter and give me some tracks.”
“Well, didn’t he?” said Sim.
“Nay, not he. We only talked once ’bout ’ligious matters, and ’bout the chapel—ay, and we talked ’bout you an’ all.”
“’Bout me?” said Sim, getting interested, and pausing with his mug half way to his lips.
“Yes,” said the landlord. “It come about throof me saying I see he’d gotten your missus to keep house for him.”