“Will you come in?”
“I have not time now,” answered Frank. “But I thought I’d just drive round and tell you the news, Stephen. I’m going to have Pitchley’s Farm.”
“Who says so?”
“I have now been settling it with Mr. Brandon. At first, he seemed unwilling to let me have it—was afraid, I suppose, that I and the farm might come to grief together—but he consented at last. So I shall get in as soon as I can, and take Annet with me. You’ll come to our wedding, Stephen?”
“A fine match she is!” cried cranky Stephen.
“What’s the matter with her?”
“I don’t say as anything’s the matter with her. But you have always stuck up for the pride and pomp of the Radcliffes: made out that nobody was good enough for ’em. A nice comedown for Frank Radcliffe that’ll be—old Farmer Skate’s girl.”
“We won’t quarrel about it, Stephen,” said Frank, with his good-humoured smile. “Here’s your wife. How do you do, Mrs. Radcliffe?”
Becca had come out with a wet mop in her hands, which she proceeded to wring. Some of the splashes went on Frank’s pony-gig. She wore morning costume: a dark-blue cotton gown hanging straight down on her thin, lanky figure; and an old black cap adorning her hard face. It was a great contrast: handsome, gentlemanly, well-dressed, sunny Frank Radcliffe, barrister-at-law; and that surly boor Stephen, in his rough clothes, and his shabby, hard-working wife.
“When be you going back to London?” was Becca’s reply to his salutation, as she began to rinse out the mop at the pump.