[CHAPTER X]
The county was against her, with some few exceptions. Sir George Neville and Mr. Houseman stood stoutly by her.
Sir George's influence and money obtained her certain comforts in gaol; and, in that day, the law of England was so far respected in a gaol, that untried prisoners were not thrown into cells, nor impeded, as they now are, in preparing their defense.
Her two staunch friends visited her every day, and tried to keep her heart up.
But they could not do it. She was in a state of dejection bordering upon lethargy.
"If he is dead," said she, "what matters it? If, by God's mercy, he is alive still, he will not let me die for want of a word from him. Impatience hath been my bane. Now, I say, God's will be done. I am weary of the world."
Houseman tried every argument to rouse her out of this desperate frame of mind; but in vain.
It ran its course, and then, behold, it passed away like a cloud, and there came a keen desire to live and defeat her accusers.
She made Houseman write out all the evidence against her; and she studied it by day, and thought of it by night; and often surprised both her friends by the acuteness of her remarks.
Mr. Atkins discontinued his advertisements; it was Houseman who now filled every paper with notices informing Griffith Gaunt of his accession to fortune, and entreated him for that, and other weighty reasons, to communicate in confidence with his old friend John Houseman, attorney-at-law.