"I'm going to Ireland to-night," was Raynes's remark.
The coal-merchant was a man of his word. He was hard and cruel and unkind, but in his own way he was proud of Tilly. Those people whom he was most proud of he liked to train, and he was under the impression that he trained his daughter Matilda very well. When he beat her, which he did constantly; when he scolded her, he quoted to himself the old words, "Spare the rod and spoil the child." He felt he was following in the footsteps of Holy Writ. He thought himself a very blessed man.
Now in addition to all this scolding and beating on the part of the coal-merchant with regard to Matilda Raynes, there was also a strange feeling of absolute indifference towards her stepmother. Her stepmother's name was Harriet; and Joshua Raynes thought very little of Harriet. In consequence he left her alone. She was only useful in the matter of helping him to train Matilda, but he never fussed over his second wife, and, as far as possible, let her go her own way.
Harriet Raynes quickly discovered that nothing excited Joshua Raynes so much as to talk about Tilly, more in especial to talk _against_ Tilly. He used to listen with his staring eyes fixed on his wife's face and say "Good little woman" and then go upstairs and prove things to his own satisfaction and beat Tilly because he loved her enough to consider beating essential.
She would be a very rich woman by-and-bye, for the coal-merchant did a thriving business and all his money he put by for Tilly. That was the one joy of his life. He could hurt her and torture her and yet in his queer, unaccountable way, she was the only creature he loved.
He was quite determined, however, to get to the bottom of the Irish story. If the thing was true, the girl who put on airs and kept a shop should be publicly disgraced and he would do it. He would enjoy doing it very much. He couldn't hurt the little shopkeeper--not physically, at least--but he could make her feel bad, and this he was determined to do. Mr. Desmond should feel bad, too, forsooth! What name did Tilly call him--"The"--if you please! He had never heard of anything so ridiculous in his life. He'd soon knock "The" out of the old curmudgeon.