<h2> <SPAN name="XII"> </SPAN> CHAPTER XII. <br/><br/> <span class="small"> MR. JOHN SMITH. </span> </h2>
<p>Meanwhile all Beckley and villages around were seething with a ferment
of excitement and contradiction. Esther Cripps had been strictly
ordered by the authorities to hold her tongue; and so far as in her
lay she did so. But there were others—the Squire's three men, and
even the Carrier himself, who had so many things to think, that they
were pretty sure to say some of them. One or two of them had wives;
and though these women could not be called by their very worst friends
"inquisitive," it was not right and lawful that they should be
debarred of everything. They did all they could not to know any more
than they were really bound to know; and whatever was forced upon them
had no chance of going any further.</p>
<p>This made several women look at one another slyly, each knowing more
than the other, and nodding while sounding the other's ignorance.
Until, with one accord they grew provoked at being treated so; and
truth being multiplied to its cube became, of course, infinite error.</p>
<p>Now, Mrs. Fermitage having been obliged to return to Cowley, Mary
Hookham's mother had established her power by this time; and being, as
her daughter had pronounced, a conspicuous member of the females, she
exerted herself about all that was said, and saw the other side of
everything. She never went to no public-house—nobody could say that
of her; but perhaps she could put two and two together every bit as
well as them that did. It had been her fortune to acquire exceptional
experience—or, as she put it more plainly, "she had a seed a many
things;" and the impressions left thereby upon her idiosyncrasy (or,
in her own words, "what she come to think") was and were that nothing
could be true that she had not known the like of. This was the secret
of her success in life—which, however, as yet bore no proportion to
her merits. She frankly scouted as "a pack of stuff" everything to
which her history afforded no vivid parallel. In a word, she believed
only what she had seen.</p>
<p>Now, incredulity is a grand power. To be able to say, "Oh, don't tell
me," or "None of your stuff!" when the rest of the audience, stricken
with awe, is gaping, confers at once the esteem of superior intellect
and vigour. And when there are good high people, who derive comfort
from the denial, the chances are that the active sceptic does not get
the worst of it.</p>
<p>Mrs. Hookham plainly declared that Esther's tale was neither more nor
less than a trumpery cock-and-bull story. She would not call it a
parcel of lies, because the poor girl might have dreamed it. Walking
in the snow was no more than walking in one's sleep; she knew that,
from her own experience; and if there had been no snow as yet, that
made her all the more sure to be right; the air was full of it, and of
course it would have more power overhead. Depend upon it, she had seen
a bush, if indeed she did see anything, and being so dazed by the
weather, she had gone and dreamed the rest of it.</p>
<p>Beckley, on the other hand, having known Esther ever since she toddled
out of her cradle, and knowing her brothers, the carrier, the baker,
and the butcher, and having no experience yet of Mother Hookham's
wisdom, as good as told the latter lady not to be "so bounceable." She
must not come into this parish, and pretend to know more about things
that belonged to it than those who were bred and born there.</p>
<p>But Mrs. Hookham's opinion was, in one way, very important, however
little weight it carried at the Dusty Anvil. Mr. Oglander himself had
to depend for his food entirely on Mrs. Hookham's efforts; for Betty,
the cook, went purely off her head, after all she had gone through;
and they put her in bed with a little barley-water, and much malt
liquor in a nobler form. And though Mrs. Hookham at her time of life
was reluctant so to demean herself, she found all the rest such a
"Noah's compass," that she roused up the fires of departed youth, and
flourished with the basting-ladle. A clever well-conditioned dame,
with a will of her own, is somebody.</p>
<p>"Now, sir," she cried, rushing in to the Squire, with a basin of
first-rate ox-tail soup, upon that melancholy New Year's Day, "you
have been out in the snow again! No use denying of it, sir; I can see
it by the chattering of your teeth. I call it a bad, wicked thing to
go on so. Flying in the face of the Lord like that!"</p>
<p>"You are a most kind and good soul, Mrs. Hookham. But surely you would
not have me sit with my hands crossed, doing nothing."</p>
<p>"No, no; surely not. Take the spoon in one hand, and the basin in the
other. You owe it to yourself to keep up your strength, and to some
one else as well, good sir."</p>
<p>"I have no one else now to owe it to," the old man answered, sadly
tucking his napkin into his waistcoat pockets.</p>
<p>"Yes, you have. You have your Miss Gracie, alive and kicking, as sure
as I be; and with a deal more of life in front of her; though scarce a
week passes but what I takes my regular dose of calumny. Ah, if it had
not been for that, I never could have been twenty year a widow."</p>
<p>"Don't cry, Mrs. Hookham. I beg you not to cry. You have many good
children to look after; and there still is abundance of calomel. But
why do you talk so about my darling?"</p>
<p>"Because, sir, please God, I means to see you spend many a happy year
together. Lord have mercy, if I had took for granted every trouble as
come upon me, who could a' tried for to cheat me this day? My
goodness, don't go for to swallow the bones, sir!"</p>
<p>"To be sure not. No, I was not thinking. Of course there are bones in
every tail."</p>
<p>"And a heap of bones in them Crippses' tale, sir, as won't go down
with me nohow. Have faith in the mercy of the Lord, sir; and in your
own experience."</p>
<p>"That is exactly what I try to do. There cannot be any one in the
world so bad as to hurt my Gracie. Mrs. Hookham, you never can have
seen anybody like her. She was so full of life and kindness that
everybody who knew her seemed to have her in their own family. She
never made pretence to be above herself, or any one; and she entered
into everybody's trouble quite as if she had brought it on. She never
asked them any questions, whether it might have been their own fault;
and she gave away all her own money first before she came to me for
more. She was so simple, and so pleasant, and so full of playful
ways—but there, when I think of that, it makes me almost as bad as
you women are. Take out the dish. I am very much obliged to you."</p>
<p>"Not a bit, sir, not a bit as yet," the brisk dame answered, with
tears on her cheeks. "But before very long, you will own that you was;
when you find every word I say come true. Oh my! How that startled me!
Somebody coming the short way from the fields! That wonderful man, as
is always prowling about, unbeknown to any one. They don't like me in
the village much, civil as I am to all of them. But as sure as six is
half a dozen, that Smith is the one they ought to hate."</p>
<p>"If he is there, show him in at once," said the Squire, without
further argument; "and let no one come interrupting us."</p>
<p>This was very hard upon Mrs. Hookham; and she could not help showing
it in her answer.</p>
<p>"Oh, to be sure, sir! Oh, to be sure not! What is my poor opinion
compared to his? Ah well, it is a fine thing to be a man!"</p>
<p>The man, for whose sake she was thus cast out, seemed to be of the
same opinion. He walked, and looked, and spoke as if it was indeed a
fine thing to be a man; but the finest of all things to be the man
inside his own cloth and leather. Short and thick of form he was, and
likely to be at close quarters a dangerous antagonist. And the set of
his jaws, and the glance of his eyes, showed that no want of manhood
would at the critical moment disable him. His face was of a strong red
colour, equally spread all over it, as if he lived much in the open
air, and fed well, and enjoyed his food.</p>
<p>"John Smith, your Worship—John Smith," he said, without troubling
Mrs. Hookham. "I hope I see your Worship better. Don't rise, I beg of
you. May I shut the door? Oh, Mary, your tea is waiting."</p>
<p>"Mary, indeed!" cried widow Hookham, ungraciously departing; "young
man, address my darter thus!"</p>
<p>"Now, what have you done, Smith, what have you done?" the old
gentleman asked, stooping over him. "Or have you done nothing at all
as usual? You tell me to have patience every day, and every day I have
less and less."</p>
<p>"The elements are against us, sir. If the weather had been anything
but what it is, I must have known everything long ago. Stop, sir,
stop; it is no idle excuse, as you seem to fancy. It is not the snow
that I speak of; it is the intense and deadly cold, that keeps all but
the very strong people indoors. How can any man talk when his beard is
frozen? Look, sir!"</p>
<p>From his short brown beard he took lumps of ice, beginning to thaw in
the warmth of the room, and cast them into the fire to hiss. Mr.
Oglander gazed as if he thought that his visitor took a liberty, but
one that could not matter much. "Go on, sir, with your report," he
said.</p>
<p>"Well, sir, in this chain of crime," Mr. Smith replied in a sprightly
manner, "we have found one very important link."</p>
<p>"What is it, Smith? Don't keep me waiting. Don't fear me. I am now
prepared to stand anything whatever."</p>
<p>"Well, sir, we have discovered, at last, the body of your Worship's
daughter."</p>
<p>The Squire bowed, and hid his face. By the aid of faith, he had been
hoping against hope, till it came to this. Then he looked up, with his
bright old eyes for the moment very steady, and said with a firm
though hollow voice—</p>
<p>"The will of the Lord be done! The will of the Lord be done, Smith."</p>
<p>"The will of the Lord shall not be done," cried Mr. Smith
emphatically, and striking his thick knees with his fist, "until the
man who has done it shall be swung, Squire, swung! Make up your mind
to that, your Worship. You may safely make up your mind to that."</p>
<p>"What good will it do me?" the father asked, talking with himself
alone. "Will it ever bring back my girl—my child? Bereaved I am, but
it cannot be long! I shall meet her in a better world, Smith."</p>
<p>"To be sure your Worship will, with the angels and archangels. But to
my mind that will be no satisfaction, till the man has swung for it."</p>
<p>"Excuse me for a moment, will you, Mr. Smith, excuse me? I have no
right to be overcome, and I thought I had got beyond all that. Ring
the bell, and they will bring you cold sirloin and a jug of ale. Help
yourself, and don't mind me. I will come back directly. No, thank you;
I can walk alone. How many have had much worse to bear! You will find
the under-cut the best."</p>
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