MR. IRWINE returned from Stoniton in a post-chaise that night, and the first words Carroll said to him, as he entered the house, were, that Squire Donnithorne was dead — found dead in his bed at ten o’clock that morning — and that Mrs. Irwine desired him to say she should be awake when Mr. Irwine came home, and she begged him not to go to bed without seeing her.
“Well, Dauphin,” Mrs. Irwine said, as her son entered her room, “you’re come at last. So the old gentleman’s fidgetiness and low spirits, which made him send for Arthur in that sudden way, really meant something. I suppose Carroll has told you that Donnithorne was found dead in his bed this morning. You will believe my prognostications another time, though I daresay I shan’t live to prognosticate anything but my own death.”
“What have they done about Arthur?” said Mr. Irwine. “Sent a messenger to await him at Liverpool?”
“Yes, Ralph was gone before the news was brought to us. Dear Arthur, I shall live now to see him master at the Chase, and making good times on the estate, like a generous-hearted fellow as he is. He’ll be as happy as a king now.”
Mr. Irwine could not help giving a slight groan: he was worn with anxiety and exertion, and his mother’s light words were almost intolerable.
“What are you so dismal about, Dauphin? Is there any bad news? Or are you thinking of the danger for Arthur in crossing that frightful Irish Channel at this time of year?”
“No, Mother, I’m not thinking of that; but I’m not prepared to rejoice just now.”
“You’ve been worried by this law business that you’ve been to Stoniton about. What in the world is it, that you can’t tell me?”
“You will know by and by, mother. It would not be right for me to tell you at present. Good-night: you’ll sleep now you have no longer anything to listen for.”
Mr. Irwine gave up his intention of sending a letter to meet Arthur, since it would not now hasten his return: the news of his grandfather’s death would bring him as soon as he could possibly come. He could go to bed now and get some needful rest, before the time came for the morning’s heavy duty of carrying his sickening news to the Hall Farm and to Adam’s home.
Adam himself was not come back from Stoniton, for though he shrank from seeing Hetty, he could not bear to go to a distance from her again.
“It’s no use, sir,” he said to the rector, “it’s no use for me to go back. I can’t go to work again while she’s here, and I couldn’t bear the sight o’ the things and folks round home. I’ll take a bit of a room here, where I can see the prison walls, and perhaps I shall get, in time, to bear seeing her.”
Adam had not been shaken in his belief that Hetty was innocent of the crime she was charged with, for Mr. Irwine, feeling that the belief in her guilt would be a crushing addition to Adam’s load, had kept from him the facts which left no hope in his own mind. There was not any reason for thrusting the whole burden on Adam at once, and Mr. Irwine, at parting, only said, “If the evidence should tell too strongly against her, Adam, we may still hope for a pardon. Her youth and other circumstances will be a plea for her.”
“Ah, and it’s right people should know how she was tempted into the wrong way,” said Adam, with bitter earnestness. “It’s right they should know it was a fine gentleman made love to her, and turned her head wi’ notions. You’ll remember, sir, you’ve promised to tell my mother, and Seth, and the people at the farm, who it was as led her wrong, else they’ll think harder of her than she deserves. You’ll be doing her a hurt by sparing him, and I hold him the guiltiest before God, let her ha’ done what she may. If you spare him, I’ll expose him!”
“I think your demand is just, Adam,” said Mr. Irwine, “but when you are calmer, you will judge Arthur more mercifully. I say nothing now, only that his punishment is in other hands than ours.”
Mr. Irwine felt it hard upon him that he should have to tell of Arthur’s sad part in the story of sin and sorrow — he who cared for Arthur with fatherly affection, who had cared for him with fatherly pride. But he saw clearly that the secret must be known before long, even apart from Adam’s determination, since it was scarcely to be supposed that Hetty would persist to the end in her obstinate silence. He made up his mind to withhold nothing from the Poysers, but to tell them the worst at once, for there was no time to rob the tidings of their suddenness. Hetty’s trial must come on at the Lent assizes, and they were to be held at Stoniton the next week. It was scarcely to be hoped that Martin Poyser could escape the pain of being called as a witness, and it was better he should know everything as long beforehand as possible.
Before ten o’clock on Thursday morning the home at the Hall Farm was a house of mourning for a misfortune felt to be worse than death. The sense of family dishonour was too keen even in the kind-hearted Martin Poyser the younger to leave room for any compassion towards Hetty. He and his father were simple-minded farmers, proud of their untarnished character, proud that they came of a family which had held up its head and paid its way as far back as its name was in the parish register; and Hetty had brought disgrace on them all — disgrace that could never be wiped out. That was the all-conquering feeling in the mind both of father and son — the scorching sense of disgrace, which neutralised all other sensibility — and Mr. Irwine was struck with surprise to observe that Mrs. Poyser was less severe than her husband. We are often startled by the severity of mild people on exceptional occasions; the reason is, that mild people are most liable to be under the yoke of traditional impressions.
“I’m willing to pay any money as is wanted towards trying to bring her off,” said Martin the younger when Mr. Irwine was gone, while the old grandfather was crying in the opposite chair, “but I’ll not go nigh her, nor ever see her again, by my own will. She’s made our bread bitter to us for all our lives to come, an’ we shall ne’er hold up our heads i’ this parish nor i’ any other. The parson talks o’ folks pitying us: it’s poor amends pity ’ull make us.”
“Pity?” said the grandfather, sharply. “I ne’er wanted folks’s pity i’ MY life afore...an’ I mun begin to be looked down on now, an’ me turned seventy-two last St. Thomas’s, an’ all th’ underbearers and pall-bearers as I’n picked for my funeral are i’ this parish and the next to ’t....It’s o’ no use now...I mun be ta’en to the grave by strangers.”
“Don’t fret so, father,” said Mrs. Poyser, who had spoken very little, being almost overawed by her husband’s unusual hardness and decision. “You’ll have your children wi’ you; an’ there’s the lads and the little un ’ull grow up in a new parish as well as i’ th’ old un.”
“Ah, there’s no staying i’ this country for us now,” said Mr. Poyser, and the hard tears trickled slowly down his round cheeks. “We thought it ’ud be bad luck if the old squire gave us notice this Lady day, but I must gi’ notice myself now, an’ see if there can anybody be got to come an’ take to the crops as I’n put i’ the ground; for I wonna stay upo’ that man’s land a day longer nor I’m forced to’t. An’ me, as thought him such a good upright young man, as I should be glad when he come to be our landlord. I’ll ne’er lift my hat to him again, nor sit i’ the same church wi’ him...a man as has brought shame on respectable folks...an’ pretended to be such a friend t’ everybody....Poor Adam there...a fine friend he’s been t’ Adam, making speeches an’ talking so fine, an’ all the while poisoning the lad’s life, as it’s much if he can stay i’ this country any more nor we can.”
“An’ you t’ ha’ to go into court, and own you’re akin t’ her,” said the old man. “Why, they’ll cast it up to the little un, as isn’t four ’ear old, some day — they’ll cast it up t’ her as she’d a cousin tried at the ’sizes for murder.”
“It’ll be their own wickedness, then,” said Mrs. Poyser, with a sob in her voice. “But there’s One above ’ull take care o’ the innicent child, else it’s but little truth they tell us at church. It’ll be harder nor ever to die an’ leave the little uns, an’ nobody to be a mother to ’em.”
“We’d better ha’ sent for Dinah, if we’d known where she is,” said Mr. Poyser; “but Adam said she’d left no direction where she’d be at Leeds.”
“Why, she’d be wi’ that woman as was a friend t’ her Aunt Judith,” said Mrs. Poyser, comforted a little by this suggestion of her husbands. “I’ve often heard Dinah talk of her, but I can’t remember what name she called her by. But there’s Seth Bede; he’s like enough to know, for she’s a preaching woman as the Methodists think a deal on.”
“I’ll send to Seth,” said Mr. Poyser. “I’ll send Alick to tell him to come, or else to send up word o’ the woman’s name, an’ thee canst write a letter ready to send off to Treddles’on as soon as we can make out a direction.”
“It’s poor work writing letters when you want folks to come to you i’ trouble,” said Mrs. Poyser. “Happen it’ll be ever so long on the road, an’ never reach her at last.”
Before Alick arrived with the message, Lisbeth’s thoughts too had already flown to Dinah, and she had said to Seth, “Eh, there’s no comfort for us i’ this world any more, wi’out thee couldst get Dinah Morris to come to us, as she did when my old man died. I’d like her to come in an’ take me by th’ hand again, an’ talk to me. She’d tell me the rights on’t, belike — she’d happen know some good i’ all ............