‘Because he seems to be so much alone.’
‘Mr Hadleigh alone! What about all the people who visit the manor?’
‘Ay, they visit the manor,’ answered Aunt Hessy, with a slight shake of the head and a quiet smile.
That set Madge thinking. He did impress her as a solitary man, notwithstanding his family, his many visitors, his school treats, his flower-shows, and other signs of a busy and what ought to be a happy life. Then there was the strange thing that he should come to ask her assistance to enable him to come to terms with the harvesters.
‘I believe you are right, aunt. He is very much alone, and I suppose that was why he came to me to-day.’
‘What did he want?’ asked Dame Crawshay, with unusual quickness and an expression of anxiety Madge could not remember ever having seen on her face before. She did not understand it until long afterwards.
Having explained the object of Mr Hadleigh’s visit, as she understood it, she was surprised to see how much relieved her aunt looked. Knowing that that good woman had never had a secret in her life, and never made the least mystery about anything, she put the question direct: ‘Did you expect him to say anything else?’
‘I don’t know, Madge. He is a queer man, Mr Hadleigh, in a-many ways. He spoke to your uncle about this, and he would have nothing to do with it.’
‘And that is why they fell out at the market, I suppose.’
‘Where is Philip? He must take after his mother, for he is straightforward in everything.’