'There's a good boy! So will I. You'll be as bright as ever in the morning.' Then she whispered: 'You won't keep her here?'
'Keep her! Who? Hazel? Of course Hazel will stay here.'
'It's hardly right.'
'Pleasant, you mean, mother. You never liked her. You want to be rid of her. But how you can so misjudge a beautiful soul I cannot think. I tell you she's as pure as a daisy. Why, she could not even bear, in her maidenly reserve, the idea of marriage. It is sheer blasphemy to say such things.'
'Blasphemy, my dear, is not a thing you can do against people. It is disagreeing with the Lord that is blasphemy.'
'I must ask you, anyway, never to mention Hazel's name to me until you can think of her differently.'
When, after saying good night to Hazel and Foxy, Edward had gone to bed, Mrs. Marston shook her head.
'Edward,' she said, 'is not what he was.' She waited till Hazel came in.
'You're no wife for my son,' she said, 'you've sinned with another man.'
'I hanna done nought nor said nought; it's all other folk's doing and saying, so I dunna see as I've sinned. And I never could abear 'ee,' Hazel cried; 'I'd as lief you was dead as quick!'