'It's no joke. Nothing would induce me to live here,' said Nancy.
'I wonder why,' said Horatia meditatively. It was just what Sarah said, she remembered.
'It's not half so wonderful as the way you seem to have taken to these people,' said Nancy; and then, feeling that she had gone too far, and that Horatia thought so, she changed the conversation and spoke of the dirt of Ousebank, which actually was blown to Balmoral.
Then the gong rang, and Horatia, cheery and smiling as ever, went tripping down the grand staircase to the drawing-room to meet Mrs Clay and Sarah. This evening, rather to her surprise, Mr Clay was there, having departed from his usual habit of going straight to the dining-room and sitting down at the table before the ladies appeared. He came forward with a gauche gallantry, and offered his arm to Horatia. 'Come, little lass, I hear you lunched at Howroyd's and went over his mill to-day. Couldn't you have waited one day more?'
'He didn't want us to,' said Horatia, taking the millionaire's arm with a simple grace, as if it was quite an ordinary thing for her to go in to dinner in this style, instead of its being the first time.
'I dare say not. Howroyd was only too proud to get you there. I'm talking of my mills, which you could have seen just by waiting a day,' explained Mr Clay.
'Oh, but I am going to see your mills too. I'll come to-morrow if you will let us. Of course they will be much grander than Mr Howroyd's, so it was better to see his first and keep the best to the last.'
'Oh ay, our stuff's much grander. We make finer cloth than Howroyd's, and turn out ten times as much, I'll warrant,' said Mr Clay, with his boastful laugh.
'I think, my dear, you'd better leave a day between. You can't spend all these fine days in factories. You look tired out, an' Sarah too, trapezing up and down greasy, slippery stairs,' protested Mrs Clay.
'The wife's right, and I'd as soon you waited a few days. I don't know that I want visitors in my mills for a day or so,' chimed in the millionaire.