Only, as I tell
you, he's not good enough for you.'
'I've made up my mind, Aunt,' said Fanny, grimly.
'Yes,' mused the aunt. 'They say all things come to him who waits--'
'More than he's bargained for, eh, Aunt?' laughed Fanny rather bitterly.
The poor aunt, this bitterness grieved her for her niece.
They were interrupted by the ping of the shop-bell, and Harry's call of
'Right!' But as he did not come in at once, Fanny, feeling solicitous for
him presumably at the moment, rose and went into the shop. She saw a cart
outside, and went to the door.
And the moment she stood in the doorway, she heard a woman's common
vituperative voice crying from the darkness of the opposite side of the
road:
'Tha'rt theer, ar ter? I'll shame thee, Mester. I'll shame thee, see if I
dunna.'
Startled, Fanny stared across the darkness, and saw a woman in a black
bonnet go under one of the lamps up the side street.
Harry and Bill Heather had dragged the trunk off the little dray, and she
retreated before them as they came up the shop step with it.
'Wheer shalt ha'e it?' asked Harry.
'Best take it upstairs,' said Fanny.
She went up first to light the gas.
When Heather had gone, and Harry was sitting down having tea and pork
pie, Fanny asked:
'Who was that woman shouting?'
'Nay, I canna tell thee. To somebody, Is'd think,' replied Harry. Fanny
looked at him, but asked no more.
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