‘Perhaps I am—­yes—­perhaps I am!’

‘That I should father such a harum-scarum brood!’

‘It is very bad; but Nicholas—­’

‘He’s a scoundrel!’

‘He is not a scoundrel!’ cried she, turning quickly.  ’He’s as good and worthy as you or I, or anybody bearing our name, or any nobleman in the kingdom, if you come to that!  Only—­only’—­she could not continue the argument on those lines.  ‘Now, father, listen!’ she sobbed; ’if you taunt me I’ll go off and join him at his farm this very day, and marry him to-morrow, that’s what I’ll do!’

‘I don’t taant ye!’

‘I wish to avoid unseemliness as much as you.’

She went away.  When she came back a quarter of an hour later, thinking to find the room empty, he was standing there as before, never having apparently moved.  His manner had quite changed.  He seemed to take a resigned and entirely different view of circumstances.

’Christine, here’s a paragraph in the paper hinting at a secret wedding, and I’m blazed if it don’t point to you.  Well, since this was to happen, I’ll bear it, and not complain.  All volk have crosses, and this is one of mine.  Now, this is what I’ve got to say—­I feel that you must carry out this attempt at marrying Nicholas Long.  Faith, you must!  The rumour will become a scandal if you don’t—­that’s my view.  I have tried to look at the brightest side of the case.  Nicholas Long is a young man superior to most of his class, and fairly presentable.  And he’s not poor—­at least his uncle is not.  I believe the old muddler could buy me up any day.  However, a farmer’s wife you must be, as far as I can see.  As you’ve made your bed, so ye must lie.  Parents propose, and ungrateful children dispose.  You shall marry him, and immediately.’

Christine hardly knew what to make of this.  ’He is quite willing to wait, and so am I. We can wait for two or three years, and then he will be as worthy as—­’

’You must marry him.  And the sooner the better, if ’tis to be done at all . . .  And yet I did wish you could have been Jim Bellston’s wife.  I did wish it!  But no.’

‘I, too, wished it and do still, in one sense,’ she returned gently.  His moderation had won her out of her defiant mood, and she was willing to reason with him.

‘You do?’ he said surprised.

’I see that in a worldly sense my conduct with Mr. Long may be considered a mistake.’

’H’m—­I am glad to hear that—­after my death you may see it more clearly still; and you won’t have long to wait, to my reckoning.’

She fell into bitter repentance, and kissed him in her anguish.  ’Don’t say that!’ she cried.  ‘Tell me what to do?’

’If you’ll leave me for an hour or two I’ll think.  Drive to the market and back—­the carriage is at the door—­and I’ll try to collect my senses.  Dinner can be put back till you return.’

In a few minutes she was dressed, and the carriage bore her up the hill which divided the village and manor from the market-town.