Mr Bolt, slightly abashed, moved a few steps away, and then paused again.
“Be ye a-goin’ to send his washin’ out to Ameriky to en every week?” he enquired.
His daughter made no answer, and Mr Bolt was obliged to go indoors to seek for further information.
“When did Ned Blanchard emmygrate,” he enquired abruptly entering the kitchen.
Mrs Bolt was stooping over the fire, and it was perhaps on this account that her face became so red.
“Thursday was a fortnight, warn’t it?” she enquired. “Yes, Thursday was a fartnight he shifted.”
“Ah,” said Farmer Bolt. “Them ships which goes back’ards and for’ards to Ameriky must travel martal fast. Our Alice be a-hangin’ up his clothes to dry in the archard now.”
“There, don’t talk sich nonsence, Bolt!” cried his wife sharply. “She be but a-washin’ a few o’ the things what he left behind, o’ course.”
“That’s it, be it?” said Mr Bolt with a keen glance.
“That’s it,” rejoined Mrs Bolt, making a great rattle with the poker between the bars of the grate. Mr Bolt eyed her for a moment or two in silence, and then went slowly out again, jamming his hat firmly on his head. Several times that day his wife and daughter encountered his fixed gaze, but he asked no further questions.