“Nancy came in last night and Jagger told her what you had in your minds about starting for yourselves. My word! It was hoity-toity in a minute. She might have been sitting on t’ hot oven-plate by t’ way she got to her feet. If Jagger weds her I fancy t’ hen’ll crow louder than t’ cock in their farmyard.”
Maniwel nodded, and looked down into his daughter’s face more soberly than she had expected.
“That ’ud be because she’s a sort o’ interest in t’ concern. I’d thought about that, and reckoned on Jagger tumbling to it first thing; but when he didn’t I said naught. There’s something in it from t’ lass’s point o’ view. What did Jagger say?”
“Say! He was as dumb as a dumpling till she’d taken herself to t’ door, then he ran up and started twittering like a hedge-sparrow with a cuckoo in its nest. But he might as well have saved his wind, for her ladyship was standing on stilts, and she wasn’t for getting down when she took herself home.”
“I daresay,” commented Maniwel. “Then Jagger’ll have chucked t’ new scheme up, I reckon? I half expected as much.”
“I don’t know what he’ll have done by now,” she replied. “He shifts like t’ hands of t’ clock till you can’t tell where he is. I’d be ashamed not to have a mind o’ my own.”
“Aye,” said her father grimly, “a man ’at can’t walk unless he’s tied tight to someb’dy else, same as he was running a three-legged race, isn’t likely to make much headway, and I doubt he’ll have to fit his stride to Nancy’s if he weds her. However, she’s put him in t’ sieve and we shall have to see what comes of it.”
“He wasn’t for dropping t’ idea when he went to bed,” said Hannah as she turned indoors where the newly-lighted fire was now roaring in the grate; “and if he keeps t’ same look on his face he ought to do well in t’ undertaking line—Baldwin wouldn’t have a cat’s chance; but we shall have to wait and see what he says when he comes down to his breakfast.”
The father sat down and spreading his legs on the hearth, gave himself up to thought whilst Hannah laid the cloth and began to prepare the meal. When she came and stood over the fire where the kettle was singing cheerfully he looked up into her face.
“Will she wed him, lass?” he asked. “If he swallows his pride and begs on again——”