‘I wouldn’t a’ thought it o’ Dick,’ he said, his head thrust forward, and his eyes turning doggedly from side to side.  They say as how too much money ain’t good for a man, but it’s changed him past all knowin’.’

‘He always had a good deal too much to say for himself,’ remarked Mrs. Clay, speaking with difficulty through her quickened breath, the bundle almost more than she could manage.

‘I wish just now as he’d say a bit more,’ said Daniel.  ’Now, see, here’s a letter I’ve just got from him.  I wrote to him last night to let him know of things as was goin’ round at the lecture.  There’s one or two of our men, you know, think he’d ought to be made to smart a bit for the way he’s treated Emma, and last night they up an’ spoke—­you should just a’ ‘eard them.  Then someone set it goin’ as the fault wasn’t Dick’s at all.  See what I mean?  I don’t know who started that.  I can’t think as he’d try to blacken a girl’s name just to excuse himself; that’s goin’ a bit too far.’

Mrs. Clay came to a standstill.

‘He’s been saying things of Emma?’ she cried.  ’Is that what you mean?’

‘Well, see now.  I couldn’t believe it, an’ I don’t rightly believe it yet.  I’ll read you the answer as he’s sent me.’

Daniel gave forth the letter, getting rather lost amid its pretentious periods, with the eccentric pauses and intonation of an uneducated reader.  Standing in a busy thoroughfare, he and Kate almost blocked the pavement; impatient pedestrians pushed against them, and uttered maledictions.

‘I suppose that’s Dick’s new way o’ sayin’ he hadn’t nothin’ to do with it,’ Daniel commented at the end.  ’Money seems always to bring long words with it somehow.  It seems to me he’d ought to speak plainer.’

‘Who’s done it, if he didn’t?’ Kate exclaimed, with shrill anger.  ’You don’t suppose there’s another man ’ud go about telling coward lies?  The mean wretch!  Says things about my sister, does he?  I’ll be even with that man yet, never you mind.’

‘Well, I can’t believe it o’ Dick,’ muttered Dabbs.  ’He says ’ere, you see, as he hasn’t time to contradict “idle stories.”  I suppose that means he didn’t start ’em.’

‘If he tells one lie, won’t he tell another?’ cried the woman.  She was obliged to put down her bundle on a doorstep, and used the moment of relief to pour forth vigorous vituperation.  Dick listened with an air half of approval, half doggedly doubtful.  He was not altogether satisfied with himself.

’Well, I must get off ‘ome,’ he said at length.  ’It’s only right as you should know what’s goin’ on.  There’s no one believes a word of it, and that you can tell Emma.  If I hear it repeated, you may be sure I’ll up an’ say what I think.  It won’t go no further if I can stop it.  Well, so long!  Give my respects to your sister.’