mill.

Mary Whittaker's position in the town after her marriage to Parfitt was
quietly accepted by the community of weavers. They still called her by
her maiden name, but there was nothing unusual in that. Often, too, she
was referred to as "Mary that was selled for sixpence," but here again,
at least as far as the older generation was concerned, no stigma was
implied. It was simply a frank statement of fact. With the younger
generation, however, who were quicker than their elders in absorbing new
ideas and new codes of social convention, "Mary that was selled for
sixpence" was a name that aroused curiosity, and sometimes derision.
Occasionally Mary's stepdaughters would be twitted about the name at the
mill, and their faces would burn as they realised that a dark shadow
hung over the woman whom they had been taught to call mother, and who
had won their hearts from the day on which she first set foot in their
father's house. Once they spoke of the matter to their father, anxious
to learn the exact truth from his lips.

"Aye, I bowt her for sixpence afore I wed her," he said, looking them
steadily in the face, "an' t' man that selled her to me said I'd gotten
her muck-cheap. Them was t' truest words he iver spak, an' shoo would
hae been muck-cheap if I'd gien a million pund for her."

During all the years that Mary Whittaker had spent at Holmton she had
not once caught sight of Samuel Learoyd. Fieldhead Farm was only four
miles away, but she had never had the courage to go near it. The farmer
visited Holmton only on market days, and notlung could ever induce his
stepdaughter to go near the scene of her deep humiliation. But though
she did not see Learoyd he was never long out of her mind, and through
her husband and children she kept herself informed of what was going on
at the farm.

After his shameless traffic in the Holmton market-place Learoyd had for
some months lived alone. Never a sociable man, he shunned the society of
the neighbouring farmers, and they, on their side, resenting his
outrageous conduct to his stepdaughter, studiously kept out of his way.
Doggedly he set himself to do both the labours of the house and farm,
and sought to stifle in hard work the memory of his wife's desertion of
him, together with whatever twinges of remorse may have come to him when
he thought of the revenge which he had taken upon her daughter. But as
time went on he found it impossible to attend to all his duties. Nothing
cou