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Mr Cheesacre, when he drove back to Oileymead alone from Norwich, after dining with Mrs Greenow, had kept himself hot, and almost comfortable, with passion against Bellfield; and his heat, if not his comfort, had been sustained by his seeing the Captain, with his portmanteau, escaping just as he reached his own homestead.
The poor fellow was no doubt thinking how much better was his lot at Vavasor Hall than it had been at Oileymead. "I shan't stay long, Miss Vavasor, only just a night or so; but I did want to see your aunt again, and you, too, upon my word." "My aunt is the attraction, Captain Bellfield. We all know that."
"You know you put it into my head your own self," pleaded Mr Cheesacre. "Didn't you, now?" "But things are so different since that," said the widow. "How different? I ain't different. There's Oileymead just where it always was, and the owner of it don't owe a shilling to any man. How are things different?" "My niece has inherited property." "And is that to make a change? Oh!
As they went up through the wood there had been some laughter between them over Aunt Greenow's letter; and they had discussed almost with mirth the merits of Oileymead and Mr Cheesacre; but as they got further on to the fell, and as the half-melancholy wildness of the place struck them, their words became less light, and after a while they almost ceased to speak.
"If there's anything you like to have changed, I'll change it at once. I'll give up Oileymead altogether, if you don't like being so near the farm-yard. I'll give up anything; so I will. Mrs Greenow, if you only knew how I've set my heart upon it!" And now, though his back was turned, the whimpering of his voice told plainly that tears were in his eyes. She was a little touched.
"We are not likely to starve," said Mrs Greenow, pointing to the delicacies from Oileymead. "Just a few trifles that my old woman asked me to bring in," said Cheesacre. "She insisted on putting them up." "But your old woman is by far too magnificent," said Mrs Greenow. "She really frightens Kate and me out of our wits."
But as I was saying, Mrs Greenow, you have seen my little place at Oileymead." "A charming house. All you want is a mistress for it." "That's it; that's just it. All I want is a mistress for it. And there's only one woman on earth that I would wish to see in that position. Arabella Greenow, will you be that woman?"
He could, however, not keep himself from hinting that Oileymead was a substantial home, and that Bellfield had not as much as a straw mattress to lie upon. In answer to this Mrs Greenow told him that there was so much more reason why some one should provide the poor man with a mattress. "If you look at it in that light, of course it's true," said Cheesacre.
"You won't see much of the Captain, I suppose," said Mr Cheesacre to Mrs Greenow on the morning of the day after her arrival at Norwich. He had come across the whole way from Oileymead to ask her if she found herself comfortable, and perhaps with an eye to the Norwich markets at the same time.
"And only think what my condition will be if I have no one here to support me. Do come. Journeys are nothing nowadays. Don't you know I would go seven times the distance for you? Mr Cheesacre and Captain Bellfield are friends after all, and Mr Cheesacre is to be best man. Is it not beautiful? As for poor me, I'm told I haven't a chance left of becoming mistress of Oileymead and all its wealth."
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