I bade him not be foolish—he had a better opinion of me, I hoped, than that—asked what of ‘the pride which apes humility,’ and so forth; and all the while questions about Nellie, her health, her well-being, her present whereabouts, scorched my tongue. I invited him to my rooms—which I think pleased him—so that we might talk more at our ease; but he told me he had the better part of a twenty-mile drive before him, back to Westrea, a farm which he had lately bought on the Suffolk border. We therefore agreed that, when I had sent my horse back to the stable, I should join him at the inn, just off the Market Place, where his gig was put up. And in the dingy inn parlour, some quarter of an hour later, I at last found courage and voice to enquire for Nellie. His face clouded, I thought. ‘In answering you frankly, I give you the strongest proof of friendship which I can give,’ he said. I thanked him. ‘It went hard with her at first, poor lass,’ he continued, ‘brave and dutiful though she is. And that’s what has brought me further south. I judged it best to get her right away from the Yorkshire country and sound of Yorkshire speech. So I threw up my tenancy of the place I had taken on leaving Mere Ban. I may tell you I came into some little money through the death of a relative, last year, which enabled me to buy this Westrea farm. I took Nellie with me to view it, and the house caught her fancy. ’Tis a pretty old red-brick place, and my gift to her. I want her to make a home of it, and interest herself in the development of the property—about nine hundred acres in all. She has an excellent head for business; and, in my opinion, there’s no better medicine than keeping hands and brain occupied in such a case as hers.’ He broke off abruptly, as though unwilling to pursue the subject further, adding: ‘But there, come and see for yourself what our new quarters are like, Brownlow. No purple wind-swept fells piled up to high heaven behind it, truly; still, a pleasant enough spot in its way, and fine corn-land too. I can offer you a comfortable bed and a good plain dinner; and a horse you needn’t be ashamed to ride, notwithstanding your free run of his Lordship’s stud at Hover. Come during the vacation. Easter falls late this year; and the orchard trees should be in blossom, supposing we get a fine spring, as I believe we shall. It’ll do you no harm to drop your classics and mathematics, part company with your scandalous old heathen poets and divinities and take the living world of to-day by the hand for forty-eight hours or so. I’ll be bound your radicalism has deteriorated in this academic dry-as-dust atmosphere too, and will be none the worse for a little wholesome rubbing up.’