"Well, my lord," he said, when he had listened with intense interest to the said history, "I am sartain sure I should ha' done exactly as you did. Such a fortin as that very few men could ha' resisted. It was a sore temptation, there's no doubt. I allers thought that yon poor creature had been summat above her condition. She had bonny hair, an' the smallest foot an' hand in the world. People that work hard, allers show it most in the extremities. Labour calls out the muscles and sinews, makes the limbs large, an' gives breadth more than height to the figure, tans the complexion, an' makes it ruddy an' coarse. To such as I this be real beauty, but you lords of the creation prefer a white skinned, die away, half dead an' alive sort o' a cretur, to a well grown healthy buxom lass like our Dorothy, who ha' grown up just as God made her, whom all the delicate women folk envy, an' all the young men are mad arter. She be just what I call a beauty."
Dorothy laughed at her foster-father's ideas of real beauty, and told him that she was not at all flattered by his description, as she was very much afraid the gentle folks would consider it "barn-yard beauty."
"Don't you mind what they call it, my Lady Dorothy. I 'spose I must call you so now. You need not be ashamed to show your face anywhere; all I be afeared on is this, that when you go home to live in the grand old Hall, that belonged to him," pointing up to the picture, "you'll forget the cross old man who was father to you, when you had none. An' you might ha' been my own darter too," he added, with a sigh, "but for my greed. An' your children an' Gilbert's might have inherited the home of my ancestors. I was nigh cursing Gilbert 'tother day, but Gilly has more cause to curse me. Alack, alack, what poor miserable blind creatures we be! It is well for us, that God's providence is at work behind it all."
"Father, you need never fear my forgetting you," said Dorothy; "I have known this change in my fortunes a long time; and have you found any alteration in my regard?"
"An' did a' wait upon the old man for the last three months, an' knew a' was a titled lady all the time?"
"I'm not a titled lady to you, dear father, but always your own little Dorothy. Where I am—you must go too, and when I leave Heath Farm, you will have to go to Heath Hall, for I cannot live without you; and kind Mrs. Brand has prepared a nice room for you; and we will try and make you forget all the past troubles," and she put her arm round his neck and kissed him.
"Rushmere, I shall grow jealous of you," said Lord Wilton, "if my daughter bestows on you more kisses than she gives me. What Dorothy says is perfectly true; she considers you too old to trouble about the farm, that it is high time you should rest from labour. You must allow her to have her own way in this matter. I have no doubt that she will contrive to make you happy."
A week later, and Dorothy's claims were established on a legal basis, and all the country rang with the romantic tale.
Mrs. Lane put on her best bonnet and hurried up to Nancy Watling, with the newspaper in her hand. She had run every step of the way, a good half mile, for fear Miss Watling should hear the news from any one else, and when she burst into the parlour, she was too much out of breath to speak.
Miss Watling ran upstairs for her smelling bottle, thinking that the good woman was going to faint. By the time, however, that she reached the parlour, the vendor of small wares had recovered the use of her tongue.