“I know,” said Gemp to a great many people; “gardening, eh? He! he! he! hi! hi! hi! You wouldn’t have thought it in a parson? But, there, he’s very young!”
“Yes, he is very young, Mr Gemp,” said Mrs Pinet one morning to that worthy, who quite occupied the ground that would have been covered by a local journal. For, having retired years back from business, he had—not being a reading man—nothing whatever to do but stand at his door and see what went on. “Yes, he is very young, Mr Gemp,” said Mrs Pinet. “But poor young man, I suppose he can’t help it.”
“Help it, no! Just the age, too, when a fellow’s always thinking about love. We know better at our time of life, eh?”
Mrs Pinet, who was one of those plump and rosy ladies with nice elastic flesh, which springs up again wherever time has made a crease, so that it does not show, bridled a little, and became very much interested in her row of geraniums in the parlour window, every one of which had lately been made more ornamental by a coat of red lead over its pot. For Mrs Pinet did not yet know better. She had known better five years before, when Gemp had asked her to wed; but at the time present she was wondering whether, if Mr Thickens at the bank, where her little store of money lay, should fail, after all, to make her an offer, it was possible that Mr Robert Hallam might think it very nice to have some one to go on always taking so much care of his linen as she did, and seeing that his breakfast bacon was always nicely broiled, his coffee clear, and his dinners exactly as he liked to have them. Certainly he was a good deal younger than she was; but she did not see why the wife should not be the elder sometimes, as well as the husband.
Hence it was that Gemp’s words jarred.
“Seems rum, don’t it?” continued Gemp. “I went by the other day, and there he was with his coat off, helping Luttrell, wheeling barrows, and I’ve seen him weeding before now.”
“Well, I’m sure it’s very kind of him,” said Mrs Pinet quickly. She could not speak tartly; her physique and constitution forbade.
“Oh, yes, it’s very kind of him indeed; but he’d better be attending to his work.”
“I’m sure he works very hard in the place.”
“Oh, yes. Of course he does; but, don’t you see?”