Page:Eliot - Felix Holt, the Radical, vol. I, 1866.djvu/207

Rh unpaid. Mrs Transome had taken an opportunity of saying that Jermyn had had some of the mortgage-deeds transferred to him, and that his rent was set against so much interest. Harold had only said, in his careless yet decisive way, "O, Jermyn be hanged! It seems to me if Durfey hadn't died and made room for me, Jermyn would have ended by coming to live here, and you would have had to keep the lodge and open the gate for his carriage. But I shall pay him off—mortgages and all—by-and-by. I'll owe him nothing—not even a curse." Mrs Transome said no more. Harold did not care to enter fully into the subject with his mother. The fact that she had been active in the management of the estate—had ridden about it continually, had busied herself with accounts, had been head-bailiff of the vacant farms, and had yet allowed things to go wrong—was set down by him simply to the general futility of women's attempts to transact men's business. He did not want to say anything to annoy her: he was only determined to let her understand, as quietly as possible, that she had better cease all interference.

Mrs Transome did understand this; and it was very little that she dared to say on business, though there was a fierce struggle of her anger and