“Yes.”
“I wish with all my heart I could think so.”
“How can you know all that such a marriage would mean to me, and this big property, and him?”
“I have thought of all that, Sir Geoffrey. Indeed, indeed, I have thought of little else since her ladyship first came here. She is a lady of quality——”
“Every inch of her.”
“And very clever. She would push the fortunes of her husband. There is a barony in abeyance which could be terminated in favour of her son, if she had a son. Her money would lift the mortgage which cripples the estate. Her money would build new cottages, fertilise our thin soil, put farming upon a higher plane, transform Nether-Applewhite into what has been the dream of your life—and mine—a model village.”
The Squire stared at him. Fishpingle’s powers of speech had affected him before, but never so convincingly. He said curtly:
“You have the gift of the gab, Ben. God knows where you get it from. More, you have the knack of reading my mind, of echoing my thoughts, using the very phrases that are mine.”
“Everything I have said is so obvious.”
“Obvious? Um! Is that another stab in the back? Well, I am obvious. I despise twisting and wriggling. You have left out the most obvious thing. And I dislike mentioning it. Her little ladyship cottoned to the boy. She wants him, or she did want him, b’ Jove! And now, this girl, this Radical parson’s daughter without a bob, without any breeding, not much better than any blooming, red-cheeked milk-maid, has undone all my work. What cursed spell has she cast?”