"
"No one now in the place but her"--the old man lifted his elbow, as
a coachman does in passing--"and him down in the yellow jug. All the
French sailors are at sea. Only she won't go away; and she moaneth
worse than all the owls and ghosts. Ah, your honour should never 'a done
that--respectable folk to Springhaven too!"
"It was a slight error of judgment, Jerry. What a mealy lot these
English are, to make such a fuss about a trifle! But I am too
soft-hearted to blow her up. Tell her to meet me in half an hour by the
broken dial, and to bring the brat, and all her affairs in a bundle such
as she can carry, or kick down the hill before her. In half an hour, do
you understand? And if you care for your stiff old bones, get out of the
way by that time."
In that half-hour Carne gathered in small compass, and strapped up in a
little "mail"--as such light baggage then was called--all his important
documents, despatches, letters, and papers of every kind, and the cash
he was entrusted with, which he used to think safer at Springhaven. Then
he took from a desk which was fixed to the wall a locket bright with
diamonds, and kissed it, and fastened it beneath his neck-cloth. The
wisp of hair inside it came not from any young or lovely head, but from
the resolute brow of his mother, the woman who hated England. He should
have put something better to his mouth; for instance, a good beef
sandwich. But one great token of his perversion was that he never did
feed well--a sure proof of the unrighteous man, as suggested by the
holy Psalmist, and more distinctly put by Livy in the character he gives
Hannibal.
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