"
"Then you will have to tell him, that is all."
"Never; no more shall you. I'll not trust my fate, and Sir Charles's,
to a man that has no eyes."
For this feminine reason she took a spite against poor Oldfield; but to
Mr. Angelo she suppressed the real reason, and entered into that ardent
gentleman's grounds of discontent, though these alone would not have
entirely dissolved her respect for the family solicitor.
Next afternoon Angelo came to her in great distress and ire. "Beaten!
beaten! and all through our adversaries having more talent. Mr. Bassett
did not appear at first. Wheeler excused him on the ground that his
wife was seriously ill through the fright. Bassett's servants were
called, and swore to the damage and to the men, all but one. He got
off. Then Oldfield made a dry speech; and a tradesman he had prepared
offered bail. The magistrates were consulting, when in burst Mr.
Bassett all in black, and made a speech fifty times stronger than
Oldfield's, and sobbed, and told them the rioters had frightened his
wife so she had been prematurely confined, and the child was dead.
Could they take bail for a riot, a dastardly attack by a mob of cowards
on a poor defenseless woman, the gentlest and most inoffensive creature
in England? Then he went on: 'They were told I was not in the house;
and then they found courage to fling stones, to terrify my wife and
kill my child.
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