'I towd him mysen,' said Mrs. Goodall, ''Er's held back all this long,
let 'er stop as 'er is. 'E'd none ha' had thee for _my_ tellin'--tha
hears. No, 'e's a fool, an' I know it. I says to him, 'Tha looks a man,
doesn't ter, at thy age, goin' an' openin' to her when ter hears her
scrat' at th' gate, after she's done gallivantin' round wherever she'd a
mind. That looks rare an' soft.' But it's no use o' any talking: he
answered that letter o' thine and made his own bad bargain.'
But in spite of the old woman's anger, she was also flattered at Fanny's
coming back to Harry. For Mrs. Goodall was impressed by Fanny--a woman of
her own match. And more than this, everybody knew that Fanny's Aunt Kate
had left her two hundred pounds: this apart from the girl's savings.
So there was high tea in Princes Street when Harry came home black from
work, and a rather acrid odour of cordiality, the vixen Jinny darting in
to say vulgar things. Of course Jinny lived in a house whose garden end
joined the paternal garden. They were a clan who stuck together, these
Goodalls.
It was arranged that Fanny should come to tea again on the Sunday, and
the wedding was discussed. It should take place in a fortnight's time at
Morley Chapel. Morley was a hamlet on the edge of the real country, and
in its little Congregational Chapel Fanny and Harry had first met.
What a creature of habit he was! He was still in the choir of Morley
Chapel--not very regular.
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