“Not a word would she answer, but goes on cryin’.
“‘Jenny Medway,’ I says to her, ‘I’ll come to the bottom of this here tale if I do have to call Policeman Jackson in for to take ’ee to prison. Tell I the truth this minute, or I’ll run out an’ fetch en. It won’t be the first time as you’ve met that man, whoever he be. Own up, or I’ll call Jackson.’
“Well, she was real scared, an’ she ketched hold o’ my arm:—
“‘Oh don’t, ma’am, don’t do that!’ she says, ‘I’ll tell ’ee—I’ll tell ’ee. ’Twas the man what did come to the door——’
“‘You wicked, wicked wench!’ I says. ‘I d’ ’low ye’ve a-been meetin’ of en regular.’
“‘No, indeed, ma’am,’ she cries, ‘I never set eyes on en since that day, till yesterday, when I did meet en quite accidental-like—an’ he did offer to carry my basket for I, an’ he did put his hand in’s pocket an’ pull out this bit o’ ribbon—he’d a-been carryin’ it about hopin’ to meet I, he did say, for he did think it jist the same colour as my eyes.’”
“Well! well! well!” exclaimed Mrs. Cross, clapping her hands together and shaking her head. “Lard now! dear to be sure! What nonsense-talk, weren’t it, ma’am?”
“I did tell her so indeed,” returned Mrs. Chaffey, severely. “I did tell her plain what I thought of her—‘Courtin’ an’ carryin’ on wi’ a tramp on the road!’ I says.
“‘He bain’t a tramp,’ she cries, quite in a temper, if you please. ‘He’s an honest, respectable young man. He’ve a-got good work now, an’ he be a-lookin’ for to settle.’”
“Ah!” put in the irrepressible Mrs. Cross. “He was lookin’ out for a wife.”