Page:Gaskell - North and South, vol. I, 1855.djvu/159

 Mrs. Thornton did not speak; but she laid her work on the table, and seemed to think.

"It will be a long way for her to walk back at night!" she remarked, at last.

"Oh but I will send her home in a cab. I never thought of her walking."

At this point, Mr. Thornton came in, just before going to the mill.

"Mother! I need hardly say, that if there is any little thing that could serve Mrs. Hale as an invalid, you will offer it, I'm sure."

"If I can find it out, I will. But I have never been ill myself, so I am not much up to invalids' fancies."

"Well! here is Fanny then, who is seldom without an ailment. She will be able to suggest something, perhaps—won't you, Fan?"

I have not always an ailment," said Fanny, pettishly; "and I am not going with mamma. I have a headache to-day, and I shan't go out."

Mr. Thornton looked annoyed. His mother's eyes were bent on her work, at which she was now stitching away busily.

"Fanny! I wish you to go," said he, authoritatively. "It will do you good, instead of harm. You will oblige me by going, without my saying anything more about it."

He went abruptly out of the room after saying this.

If he had staid a minute longer, Fanny would have cried at his tone of command, even when he used the words, "You will oblige me." As it was, she grumbled.

"John always speaks as if I fancied I was ill, and