"Ay, was it. Dost think I'm minded on such a day as this, to stand shivering at the lane-end while thou block'st the way?—So, 'tis thou, is it?" he broke off, with a sharper glance at Hiram. "I thought that slouch of thine was woundily familiar. Art minded to boast of the great store of peats ye have at Marsh, as thou didst not long since to my grandson?"
Hiram winced, for it was bitter to him still to think how easily Red Ratcliffe had outwitted him, and Nanny's late banter had rubbed an old wound raw. "We've fewer peats, Maister," he said slowly—"but th' owd house stands, I've noticed. Ay, 'tis proof agen fire an' sword, they say."
Old Nicholas could make nothing of the farm-man's stolid front. "Cherish that belief, and teach it to thy Master," he said.
"Nay, he needs no teaching. He knaws, weel as I can tell him, that a Brown Dog ligs on th' threshold, an'——"
The Lean Man loosed the curb on a sudden and rode into the snowstorm that blew dusty up the lane.
"I thowt he wodn't stay to hear no more," said Hiram to his horse. "Get on, old lad, an' if we find Shameless Wayne at Marsh, we'll tell him what we said to Nicholas Weasel-toppin. He's flaired is th' Lean Man—flaired."
Bet the slattern had moved to the cottage-door soon as she saw Mistress Wayne come through the churchyard gate with Witherlee.
"There's summat I want to axe of ye, Mistress," she said, twisting an apron-corner in her feckless hands. "I've getten a little un as is like to dee o' th' Brown Titus, an' I thowt mebbe ye'd step in next door here an' gi'e th' bairn a touch o' your hand—they like as they pike up, so to say, when they feel a softer hand on 'em nor us that wark for our bread hev getten."
The same half-troubled, half-eager look came into Mistress Wayne's face as when she had lately talked with the Sexton of children and the childless women. Cold as she was, and anxious for the warmth of the peat fire which showed through Nanny's open door, she turned on the threshold.
"If 'twill comfort the child, I'll come with thee and gladly," she said.