“And grow as cantankerous.”
“Do you want to quarrel, puppy?”
“Not I. I haven’t time.”
“What are you crying about?” said the old man, roughly, as he found that Mrs Mullion, attracted by his loud voice, had come to see what was the matter, and had heard a part of his last speech.
“At what you said, dear,” sobbed the poor woman.
“Don’t you mind what he says, Mrs Mullion,” said Geoffrey; “he doesn’t mean it. I’ll be bound to say he’s got a very soft spot in his heart somewhere.”
As he spoke Geoffrey walked out of the garden, whistling, and made for the cliff path, drinking in the deliciously-fresh sea-breeze as he went along.
“This place keeps one from having the dumps,” he said to himself, “it is so fresh and bright; but really, in spite of my vainglorious boasting, I’m afraid I am wasting time here. Nil des, though; I’m not beaten yet. Old Paul is glorious as a dose of bitters, if he didn’t give one quite so much about Brown Maudlin. Pretty girl, very; but wants ballast horribly. Hang the old man, he goes just the way to make a fellow think about her. But he’s a fine old boy. Now I’ll go and have a dose of resignation from poor old Mrs Prawle.
“That old lady always does me good,” he said, as he went on. “What sane man could grumble who has all his faculties, just because he cannot make filthy lucre, when he has that patient old lady ready to face him with her calm, subdued ways. Hang it, there’s a very pathetic side to her life!”
He did not see that he, too, was watched, as he went swinging along; but went right ahead in his thorough way, setting his mind on a certain goal, and hardly heeding any thing else; but he had not passed one clump of rocks far, when Amos Pengelly came out, and stood watching him till he disappeared, and then followed slowly, to make sure that Geoffrey went down to the Cove.