ear him.

"Stephen Whitelaw had need be a gentleman himself before he could make
me a lady," Nelly answered, laughing. "I don't think fine clothes can
make gentlefolks; no, nor farming one's own land, either, though that
sounds well enough. I am not in any hurry to leave you, father, and I'm
not one of those girls who are always thinking of getting married; but
come what may, depend upon it, I shall never marry Mr. Whitelaw."

"Why not, pray?" the bailiff asked savagely.

Nelly shook out the shirt she had been repairing for her father, and then
began to fold it, shaking her head resolutely at the same time.

"Because I detest him," she said; "a mean, close, discontented creature,
who can see no pleasure in life except money-making. I hate the very
sight of his pale pinched face, father, and the sound of his hard shrill
voice. If I had to choose between the workhouse and marrying Stephen
Whitelaw, I'd choose the workhouse; yes, and scrub, and wash, and drudge,
and toil there all my days, rather than be mistress of Wyncomb Farm."

"Well, upon my word," exclaimed the father, taking the pipe from his
mouth, and staring aghast at his daughter in a stupor of indignant
surprise, "you're a pretty article; you're a nice piece of goods for a
man to bring up and waste his substance upon--a piece of goods that will
turn round upon one and refuse a man who farms his own land. Mind, he
hasn't asked you yet, my lady; and never may, for aught I know."

"I hope he never will, father," Nelly answered quietly, unsubdued by this
outburst of the bailiff's.

"If he does, and you don't snap at such a chance, you need never look for
a sixpence from me; and you'd best make yourself scarce pretty soon into
the bargain. I'll have no such trumpery about my house."

"Very well, father; I daresay I can get my living somewhere else, without
working much harder than I do here."

This open opposition on the girl's part made William Carley only the more
obstinately bent upon that marriage, which seemed to him such a brilliant
alliance, which opened up to him the prospect of a comfortable home for
his old age, where he might repose after his labours, and live upon the
fat of the land without toil or care. He had a considerable contempt for
the owner of Wyncomb Farm, whom he thought a poor creature both as a man
and a farmer; and he fancied that if his daughter married Stephen
Whitelaw, he might become the actual master of that profitable estate.