Nancy was eminently good-looking and a notable housewife, and she went
into Tom Hamon's house of La Closerie with every hope and intention of
making him happy.
But, from the very first, little Tom set his face against her.
It would be hard to say why. Nancy racked her brain for reasons, and
could find none, and was miserable over it.
His father thrashed him for his rudeness and insolence, which only made
matters worse.
His own mother had given way to him in everything, and spoiled him
completely. After her death his father out of pity for his forlorn
estate, had equally given way to him, and only realised, too late, when
he tried to bring him to with a round turn, how thoroughly out of hand
he had got.
When little Tom found, as one consequence of the new mother's arrival,
that his father thrashed instead of humouring him, he put it all down to
the new-comer's account, and set himself to her discomfiture in every
way his barbarous little wits could devise.
He never forgot one awful week he passed in his grandmother's care--a
week that terminated in the arrival of still another new-comer, who, in
course of time, developed into little Nance.
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