“Well, but they were not to marry him,” said I, impatiently.
“No, but they did not like Miss Matey to marry below her rank. You know she was the rector’s daughter, and somehow they are related to Sir Peter Arley; Miss Jenkyns thought a deal of that.”
“Poor Miss Matey!” said I.
“Nay, now, I don’t know anything more than that he offered and was refused. Miss Matey might not like him; and Miss Jenkyns might never have said a word: it is only a guess of mine.”
“Has she never seen him since?” I inquired.
“No, I think not. You see Woodley (Cousin Thomas’s house) lies half-way between Cranford and Misselton; and I know he made Misselton his market-town very soon after he had offered to Miss Matey; and I don’t think he has been into Cranford above once or twice since. Once, when I was walking with Miss Matey in High Street, she suddenly darted from me and went up Shire Lane. A few minutes after, I was startled by meeting Cousin Thomas.”
“How old is he?” I asked, after a pause of castle-building.
“He must be about seventy, I think, my dear,” said Miss Pole, blowing up my castle, as if by gun-powder, into small fragments.
Very soon after, I had the opportunity of seeing Mr. Holbrook; seeing, too, his first encounter with his former love, after thirty or forty years’ separation. I was helping to decide whether any of the new assortment of colored silks, which they had just received at the shop, would help to match a gray and black mousseline-de-laine that wanted a new breadth, when a tall, thin, Don Quixote-looking old man came into the shop for some woollen gloves. I had never seen the person before, and I watched him rather attentively, while Miss Matey listened to the shopman. The stranger was rather striking. He wore a blue coat, with brass buttons, drab breeches, and gaiters, and drummed with his fingers on the counter, until he was attended to. When he answered the shop-boy’s question, “What can I have the pleasure of showing you to-day, sir?” I saw Miss Matilda start, and then suddenly sit down; and instantly I guessed who it was. She had made some inquiry which had to be carried round to the other shop.
“Miss Jenkyns wants the black sarcenet, two-and-twopence the yard.” Mr. Holbrook caught the name, and was across the shop in two strides.