’And when you have established your right, and shown that he bought without a proper title, then you’d stand on the doorsteps, stick in hand, and say, Pengelly! who has the empty pocket? Who is the vagabond without a house? Go pack to the devil. What be you to stye in a gentleman’s mansion? Whom God Almighty made an ass bides an ass. And cats as ain’t got manners must keep off Turkey carpets.’ Then, still holding his arm, she said, ’Come here! I’ve never shown you over this house; not that Langford is fit to compare with Coombe Park. Yet this were a gentleman’s house once. But what were the Langfords as compared with the Luxmores? You’ll see a Luxmore monument at the very altar-steps o’ the chancel in Bratton Church, but that of a Langford is half-way down the nave, which shows how different they were estimated.’ After a short silence, Charles felt a spasmodic quiver pass over her, like the thrill of a peacock when spreading its tail. ’They would have a hare-hunt, would they, and put me to a public shame?’ ’No, no, Mrs. Veale,’ said Charles caressingly, ’I’ll put a stop to that; and if they venture I’ll break the necks of those that have to do with it.’ ’Come with me,’ said the woman hoarsely, ’I’ll show you all. Here,’ she flung open the sitting-room door, ’here is the parlour where your sister went down on her knees to the master. If he’d ha’ axed her to lick his boots she’d ha’ done it—no proper pride in her—and all for ninepence a day.’ Charles became very red in the face. ’This is the desk at which the master writes and does his accounts. In it, I reckon, be his books. I’ve never seed them, and I doubt if I could make much out of ’em if I did. Them things don’t agree wi’ my faculties, as the cherub said of the armchair.’ ’Does old Langford always sit in this room?’ ’Oh yes! too proud to sit in the kitchen wi’ such as me—not even in winter. Then I must make his fire here every day, and have the worry of keeping it in. There is one thing don’t suit him now he is cut wi’ the Nanspians. Formerly he got all his fuel from their wood. There are no plantations on Langford, and the old trees are cut down. When he got his fuel at Chimsworthy he hadn’t to pay, and now he must get a rick of firing elsewhere.’ She pointed to an old-fashioned cupboard in the wall. ’There he keeps his sugar and his tea and his currants. He keeps all under key, lest I or the maidens should steal them. Now you look at me, and I’ll show you something.’ She opened an empty place under the cupboard and knocked upwards thrice with her fist, and the glass doors of the repository of the groceries flew open. She laughed huskily. ’There! if I strike I shoot up the bolt, and the lock won’t hold the doors together. When I press them together and shut back, down falls the bolt.’ ’That is ingenious, Mrs. Veale—stay, don’t shut yet. I have a sweet tooth, and see some raisins in the bag there.’