He needed it, for to stand there
hat in hand before so many women all staring at him filled him with
utter confusion, so that he could scarcely see, and stumbled along
when Mrs. Sloggett called, "Come here, young man. Is it true that it
is your brother who has won a castle and a countess in Ireland?"
"Not a countess, ma'am," said Stead, gruff with shyness, "but a
castle."
Mrs. Sloggett put him through a perfect catechism on Jeph and his
fortunes, which he answered at first almost monosyllabically, though
afterwards he could speak a little more freely, when the questions
did not go quite beyond his knowledge. Finally he succeeded in
asking permission to take Emlyn and show her his brother's letter.
Mrs. Sloggett was gracious to the brother of the lord of a castle,
even in Ireland, and moreover Emlyn was viewed in the light of one of
the Kenton family.
So leave was granted to take Master Kenton (he had never been so
called before) out into the garden of pot-herbs behind the house, and
Emlyn with her dancing step led the way, by a back door down a few
steps into a space where a paved walk led between two beds of
vegetables, bordered with a narrow edge of pinks, daisies, and
gilliflowers, to a seat under the shade of an old apple tree, looking
out, as this was high ground, over the broad river full of shipping.
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