Holt, quite an aged woman now, came in with some tea for her mistress. Francis took the opportunity to go down and see his father. Mr. Radcliffe, in a shabby old coat, was sitting in his arm-chair at the parlour fire. He looked pleased to see Francis, and kept his hand for a minute after he had shaken it.
“My mother is very ill, sir,” said Francis.
“Ay,” replied the old man, dreamily. “Been so for some time now.”
“Can nothing be done to—to—keep her with us a little longer, father?”
“I suppose not. Ask Duffham.”
“What the devil!—is it you! What brings you here?”
The coarse salutation came from Stephen. Francis turned to see him enter and bang the door after him. His shoes were dirty, his beaver gaiters splashed, and his hair was like a tangled mop.
“I came down to see my father and mother,” answered Francis, as he held out his hand. But Stephen did not choose to see it.
Mrs. Stephen, in a straight-down blue cloth gown and black cap garnished with red flowers, looking more angular and hard than of yore, came in with the tea-tray. She did as much work in the house as a servant. Lizzy had been married the year before, and lived in Birmingham with her husband, who was curate at one of the churches there.
“You’ll have to sleep on the sofa to-night, young man,” was Mrs. Stephen’s snappish salutation to Francis. “There’s not a bed in the house that’s aired.”