cable.
Miss Hanmer might be good-looking, but Richard (always called 'young' to
distinguish him from his father) had surely outgrown such a very
infantile reason of choice, when other attractions were, to the Dunfield
mind, altogether wanting. The Hanmers were not only poor, but, more
shameful still, positively 'stuck up' in their poverty. They came
originally from the south of England, forsooth, and spoke in an affected
way, pronouncing their vowels absurdly. Well, the consoling reflection
was that his wife would soon make him see that she despised him, for if
ever there was a thorough Yorkshireman, it was Richard.

Dunfield comments on Mrs. Dagworthy seemed to find some justification in
the turn things took. Richard distinctly began to neglect those of his
old friends who smacked most of the soil; if they visited his house, his
wife received them with an affected graciousness which was so
unmistakably 'stuck up' that they were in no hurry to come again, and
her behaviour, when she returned visits, was felt to be so offensive
that worthy ladies--already prejudiced--had a difficulty in refraining
from a kind of frankness which would have brought about a crisis. The
town was perpetually busy with gossip concerning the uncomfortableness
of things in the house on the Heath. Old Mr. Dagworthy, it was declared,
had roundly bidden his son seek a domicile elsewhere, since joint
occupancy of the home had become impossible. Whether such a change was
in reality contemplated could never be determined; the old man's death
removed the occasion. Mrs. Dagworthy survived him little more than half
a year. So there, said Dunfield, was a mistake well done with; and it
was disposed to let bygones be bygones.

What was the truth of all this? That Dagworthy married hastily and found
his wife uncongenial, and that Mrs. Dagworthy passed the last two years
of her life in mourning over a fatal mistake, was all that could be
affirmed as fact, and probably the two persons most nearly concerned
would have found it difficult to throw more light upon the situation.
Outwardly it was as commonplace a story as could be told; even the
accession of interest which would have come of Dagworthy's cruelty was
due to the imagination of Dunfield gossips. Richard was miserable enough
in his home, and frequently bad-tempered, but his wife had nothing worse
from him than an angry word now and then. After the first few months of
their marriage, the two lived, as f