Mr Darvell nodded again, and looked inquiringly at his wife's basket. Answering this silent question she said: "I sold 'em fairly well. Mrs Reuben got more; but hers was fatter." Mr Darvell smoked on in silence, and his wife busied herself in preparing supper, consisting of cold bacon, bread, and tea without milk; it was not until they had both been seated at the meal for a little while that she set down her cup suddenly and exclaimed: "Why, whatever's got our Frank? Isn't he home yet?" Mr Darvell's mouth was still occupied, not with his pipe, but with a thick hunk of bread, on which was laid an almost equally thick piece of fat bacon. Gazing at his wife across this barrier he nodded again, and presently murmured somewhat indistinctly: "Ah, he came home with me." "Then," repeated Mrs Darvell, fixing her eyes sharply on him, "where _is_ the lad?" Mr Darvell avoided his wife's gaze. "How should I know where he is?" he answered sullenly. "I haven't seen him, not for these two hours. He's foolin' round somewheres with the other lads." "That's not like our Frank," said Mrs Darvell, giving an anxious look round at the tall clock. "Why, it's gone eight," she went on. "What _can_ have got him?" Her eyes rested suspiciously on her husband, who shifted about uneasily. "Can't you let the lad bide?" he said; "ye'll not rest till ye make him a greater ninny nor he is by natur. He might as well ha' bin a gell, an better, for all the good he'll ever be." "How did he tackle the ploughin'?" asked Mrs Darvell, pausing in the act of setting aside Frank's supper on the dresser. "Worser nor ever," replied her husband contemptuously. "He'll never be good for nowt, but to bide at home an' keep's hands clean. Why, look at Eli Redrup, not older nor our Frank, an' can do a man's work already." "Eli Redrup!" exclaimed Mrs Darvell in a shrill tone of disgust; "you'd never even our lad to a great fullish lout like Eli Redrup, with a head like a turmut! If Frank isn't just so fierce as some lads of his age, he's got more sense than most." "I tell 'ee, he'll never be good for nowt," replied her husband doggedly, as he resumed his seat in the chimney-corner and lighted his pipe. "Onless," he added after a moment's pause, "he comes to be a schoolmaster; and it haggles me to think that a boy of mine should take up a line like that." Mrs Darvell made no answer; but as she washed up the cups and plates she cast a curious glance every now and then at her husband's silent figure, for she had a strong feeling that he knew more than he chose to tell about "our" Frank's absence.