Charles Reade

“ Ryder herself saw the wisdom of this. She bade him stay quiet, and she went to look after Griffith.
She found him in the drawing-room, with his head on the table, in deep dejection.
She assumed authority, and said he must go to bed.
He rose humbly, and followed her like a submissive dog.
She took him to his room. There was no fire.
"That is where you are to sleep," said she, spitefully.
"It is better than I deserve," said he, humbly.
The absurd rule about not hitting a man when he is down has never obtained a place in the great female soul; so Ryder lashed him without mercy. ”

“ She turned on him furiously. "Too good for thee, thou heartless creature! Thomas Leicester is here, and I know thee for a villain."
"You know nothing," cried Griffith. "Would you believe that mischief-making knave? What has he told you?"
"Go back to her!" cried Mrs. Gaunt furiously. "Me you can deceive and pillage no more. So, this was your jealousy! False and forsworn yourself, you dared to suspect and insult me. Ah! and you think I am the woman to endure this? I'll have your life for it! I'll have your life." ”

“ At this look, the prisoner, who had long contained herself with difficulty, rose, with scarlet cheeks and flashing eyes, in defence of her witness, and flung her prudence to the wind.
"Fie, sir," she cried. "The woman you insult is as pure as your own mother, or mine. She deserves the pity, the respect, the veneration of all good men. Know, my lord, that my miserable husband deceived and married her under the false name he had taken. She has the marriage-certificate in her bosom. Pray make her show it, whether she will or not. My lord, this Mercy Vint is more an angel than a woman. ”

“ What! you bid me sell you to that man for two dirty farms! O, well you know Bolton and Hernshaw were but the steps by which I hoped to climb to you: and now you tell me to part with you, and take those miserable acres instead of my darling. Ah, mistress, you have never loved, or you would hate yourself and despise yourself for what you have done. Love! if you had known what that word means, you couldn't look in my face and stab me to the heart like this. God forgive you! And sure I hope he will; for, after all, it is not your fault that you were born without a heart. Why, Kate, you are crying. ”

“ Kate's high spirit fell before this: she turned her eyes, full of tears, on him. "O, do not desert me, now that I shall need you more than ever, to guide me in my new duties. Forgive me; I did not know my own heart—quite. I'll go into a convent now, if I must; but I can't marry any man but poor Griffith. Ah, father, he is more generous than any of us! Would you believe it? when he thought Bolton and Hernshaw were coming to him, he said if I married him I should have the money to build a convent with. He knows how fond I am of a convent." ”

“ At last she looked at Neville inquiringly.
"Our worthy host is setting us an example of conviviality," said he. "He is getting drunk."
"O, I hope not," said Kate. "Has he no friend to tell him not to make a fool of himself?"
"You take a great interest in him," said Neville, bitterly.
"Of course I do. Pray, do you desert your friends when ill luck falls on them?"
"Nay, Mistress Kate, I hope not."
"You only triumph over the misfortunes of your enemies, eh?" said the stinging beauty.
"Not even that. And as for Mr. Gaunt, I am not his enemy."
"O no, of course not. You are his best friend. ”

“ Gaunt, trembling all over.
"Be brave, madam. You have borne great trouble: do not give way under joy. He who has wronged us both—he who wedded you under his own name of Griffith Gaunt, and me under the false name of Thomas Leicester—is no more dead than we are; I saw him two days ago, and spoke to him, and persuaded him to come to Carlisle town, and do you justice."
Mrs. Gaunt fell on her knees. "He is alive; he is alive. Thank God! O, thank God! He is alive; and God bless the tongue that tells me so. God bless you eternally, Mercy Vint." ”

“ Man does not speak by words alone. A mute glance of reproach has ere now pierced the heart a tirade would have left untouched; and even an inarticulate cry may utter volumes.
Such an eloquent cry was that with which Griffith Gaunt turned his back upon the angelical face he adored, and the soft, persuasive tongue. There was agony, there was shame, there was wrath, all in that one ejaculation.
It frightened Kate. She called him back. "Don't leave me so," she said. "I know I have affronted you; but I meant all for the best. Do not let us part in anger." ”

“ Griffith tossed and turned in his bed, and spent a stormy night. His mind was in a confused whirl, and his heart distracted. The wife he had loved so tenderly proved to be the very reverse of all he had lately thought her! She was pure as snow, and had always loved him; loved him now, and only wanted a good excuse to take him to her arms again. But Mercy Vint!—his wife, his benefactress! a woman as chaste as Kate, as strict in life and morals,—what was to become of her? How could he tell her she was not his wife? ”

“ Why, you can track a hare to her form, and a rat to his hole,—let alone such big game as this, with a hoof like a frying-pan,—in the snow."
"Oh, do not talk; let us make haste," panted Kate.
"Canter away!" replied the Scamp.
She cantered on, and he ran by her side.
"Shall I not tire you?" said she.
The mauvais sujet laughed at her.
"Tire me? Not over this ground. Why, I run with the hounds, and mostly always in at the death; but that is not altogether speed: ye see I know Pug's mind. What! don't you know me? I'm Tom Leicester. Why, I know you: I say, you are a good-hearted one, you are." ”

“ You ask the jury to believe that Griffith Gaunt, Esquire, a gentleman, and a man of spirit and honor, is alive, yet skulks and sends you hither, when by showing his face in this court he could clear his wife without a single word spoken?
Mercy. Yes, sir; I do hope to be believed, for I speak the naked truth. But, with due respect to you, Mr. Gaunt did not send me hither against my will. I could not bide in Lancashire, and let an innocent woman be murdered in Cumberland. ”

“ What, would you rather be condemned for murder, than let me show them you are innocent? Alas! how you hate me!"
"Hate you, child? of course I hate you. We are both of us flesh and blood, and hate one another. And one of us is honest enough, and uncivil enough, to say so."
"Speak for yourself, dame," replied Mercy, quietly, "for I hate you not; and I thank God for it. To hate is to be miserable. I'd liever be hated than to hate."
Mrs. Gaunt looked at her. "Your words are goodly and wise," said she; "your face is honest, and your eyes are like a very dove's. ”

“ I'm not the woman to pine for the fruit that is my neighbor's. All I ask for on earth is a few kind words and looks from you. You are gentle, and I am simple; but we are both one flesh and blood, and your lovely wet eyes do prove it this moment. Dame Gaunt—Kate—I ne'er was ten miles from home afore, and I am come all this weary way to serve thee. O, give me the one thing that can do me good in this world,—the one thing I pine for,—a little of your love. ”

“ Mercy went to a box and took out an old shirt of his,—the one he wore when he first came to the "Packhorse." She brought it to him and showed him "G. G." embroidered on it with a woman's hair. (Ryder's.)
"Here are your initials," said she; "now leave useless falsehoods; be a man, and tell me your real name."
"My name is Griffith Gaunt."
Mercy, sick at heart, turned her head away; but she had the resolution to urge him on. "Go on," said she, in an agonized whisper: "if you believe in God and a judgment to come, deceive me no more. The truth, I say! the truth!" ”

“ Why not take me out o' doors and bid me wash in the snow?"
"Alack, mistress," said the woman, feeling very uneasy, "we had no orders from Mr. Gaunt to light fires up stairs."
"O, if you wait for gentlemen's orders to make your house fit to live in! You knew there were a dozen ladies coming, yet you were not woman enough to light them fires. Come, take me to your own bedroom."
The woman turned red. "Mine is but a small room, my lady," she stammered.
"But there's a fire in it," said Kate, spitefully. "You servants don't wait for gentlemen's orders, to take care of yourselves." ”

“ He is afeared of her and her friends, if he shows his face in Cumberland; he is afeared of my folk, if he be seen in Lancashire. Ah, Thomas, as if I would let them harm thee."
Sir George Neville walked to and fro in grand excitement. "O blessed day that I came hither! Madam, you are an angel. You will save an innocent, broken-hearted lady from death and dishonor. Your good heart and rare wit have read in a moment the dark riddle that hath puzzled a county."
"George," said Mercy, gravely, "you have gotten the wrong end of the stick. The wise in their own conceit are blinded. ”

“ With what eagerness do we pursue! with what zeal apprehend! with what joy do we bring him to justice! Even the dreadful sentence of death does not shock us, when pronounced upon him. We hear it with solemn satisfaction; and acknowledge the justice of the Divine sentence, 'Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed.'
"But if this be the case in every common murder, what shall be thought of her who has murdered her husband,—the man in whose arms she has lain, and whom she has sworn at God's altar to love and cherish? ”

“ By and by dark mysterious words began to be thrown out in Hernshaw village.
"He will never come back at all."
"He will never come into that fortune."
"'T is no use advertising for a man that is past reading."
These, and the like equivocal sayings, were followed by a vague buzz, which was traceable to no individual author, but seemed to rise on all sides, like a dark mist, and envelop that unhappy house.
And that dark mist of Rumor soon condensed itself into a palpable and terrible whisper,—"Griffith Gaunt hath met with foul play." ”

“ And now, Griffith Gaunt, it is your turn: you must withdraw your injurious terms, and end this superlative folly."
Griffith hesitated.
"Come," said Kate, "consider: Mr. Neville is esteemed by all the county: you are the only gentleman in it who has ever uttered a disparaging word against him. Are you sure you are more free from passion and prejudice and wiser than all the county? Oblige me, and do what is right. Come, Griffith Gaunt, let your reason unsay the barbarous words your passion hath uttered against a worthy gentleman whom we all esteem." ”

“ She had lived temperately, and had not yet passed the age when happiness can restore a woman's beauty and brightness in a single day.
As for him, he was like a man in a heavenly dream: he floated in the past and the present: the recent and the future seemed obscure and distant, and comparatively in a mist.
But that same afternoon, after a most affectionate farewell, and many promises to return as soon as ever he had discharged his obligations, Griffith Gaunt started for the "Packhorse," to carry to Mercy Leicester, alias Vint, the money Catharine Gaunt had saved by self-denial and economy. ”

“ She could not understand justice praising her: it must be love.
"Ay," said Griffith, in a broken voice, "she writes like an angel: she speaks like an angel: she looks like an angel. My heart says she is an angel. But my eyes have shown me she is naught. I left her, unable to walk, by her way of it; I came back and found her on that priest's arm, springing along like a greyhound." He buried his head in his hands, and groaned aloud.
Francis turned to Mrs. Gaunt, and said, a little severely, "How do you account for that?"
"I'll tell you, Father," said Kate, "because you love me. ”