There had come to live, in one of the smaller houses upon the Heath, a family consisting of a middle-aged lady and her two daughters; their name was Hanmer, and their previous home had been in Hebsworth, the large manufacturing town which is a sort of metropolis to Dunfield and other smaller centres round about.

Mr.Hanmer was recently dead; he had been a banker, but suffered grave losses in a period of commercial depression, and left his family poorly off.

Various reasons led to his widow's quitting Hebsworth; Dunfield inquirers naturally got hold of stories more or less to the disgrace of the deceased Mr.Hanmer.The elder of the two daughters Richard Dagworthy married, after an acquaintance of something less than six months.
Dunfield threw up its hands in amazement: such a proceeding on young Dagworthy's part was not only shabby to the families which had upon him the claim of old-standing expectancy, but was in itself inexplicable.
Miss Hanmer might be good-looking, but Richard (always called 'young' to distinguish him from his father) had surely outgrown such a very infantile reason of choice, when other attractions were, to the Dunfield mind, altogether wanting.

The Hanmers were not only poor, but, more shameful still, positively 'stuck up' in their poverty.

They came originally from the south of England, forsooth, and spoke in an affected way, pronouncing their vowels absurdly.