"Would you, my lass?" he asked grimly. "But, you see, I do want you for something particular, something uncommon particular; so there's no call for you to be in a hurry. Sit down yonder," he added, pointing to the chair opposite his own. "I've got something to say to you, something serious."
"Father," said the girl, looking him full in the face, pale to the lips, but very firm, "I don't think you're in a state to talk seriously of anything."
"O, you don't, don't you, Miss Impudence? You think I'm drunk, perhaps. You'll find that, drunk or sober, I've only one mind about you, and that I mean to be obeyed. Sit down, I tell you. I'm not in the humour to stand any nonsense to-night. Sit down."
Ellen obeyed this mandate, uttered with a fierceness unusual even in Mr. Carley, who was never a soft-spoken man. She seated herself quietly on the opposite side of the hearth, while her father took down his pipe from the chimney-piece, and slowly filled it, with hands that trembled a little over the accustomed task.
When he had lighted the pipe, and smoked about half-a-dozen whiffs with a great assumption of coolness, he addressed himself to his daughter in an altered and conciliating tone.
"Well, Nelly," he said, "you've had a rare day at Wyncomb, and a regular ramble over the old house with Steph's cousin. What do you think of it?"
"I think it's a queer gloomy old place enough, father. I wonder there's any one can live in it. The dark bare-looking rooms gave me the horrors. I used to think this house was dull, and seemed as if it was haunted; but it's lively and gay as can be, compared to Wyncomb."
"Humph!" muttered the bailiff. "You're a fanciful young lady, Miss Nell, and don't know a fine substantial old house when you see one. Life's come a little too easy to you, perhaps. It might have been better for you if you'd seen more of the rough side. Being your own missus too soon, and missus of such a place as this, has spoiled you a bit. I tell you, Nell, there ain't a better house in Hampshire than Wyncomb, though it mayn't suit your fanciful notions. Do you know the size of Stephen Whitelaw's farm?"
"No, father; I've never thought about it."
"What do you say to three hundred acres—over three hundred, nigher to four perhaps?"