“Ladies at home?”
“No, they’ve gone up to the town shopping. Won’t be long.”
“Do you think they’d mind if I were to wait?”
“Mind? No. Come and have a look round.”
“Peculiarity of the Lincolnshire folk, that they rarely say sir to their superiors,” mused the Reverend Christie Bayle, as he entered the garden. “Perhaps they think we are not their superiors, and perhaps they are right; for what am I better than that old gardener?”
“Nice rain.”
“Delicious! By Geo—I—ah, you have a beautiful garden here.”
The old man gave him a droll look, and the curate’s, face turned scarlet, for that old college expression had nearly slipped out.
“Yes, it’s a nice bit of garden, and pretty fruitful considering. You won’t mind my planting another row of these broccoli?”
“Not a bit. Pray go on, and I can talk to you. Seems too bad for me to be doing nothing, and you breaking your back.”