And parson said he would; and it ended in us, all five of us, going up together, the new parson walking by me and talking to me like somebody out of the Bible, as it might be one of the disciples.
I got to know him well afterwards, and he was the best man that ever trod shoe-leather.
We all went up together to Charleston Farm, and in through the back, without knocking, and so to the parlour door. We knew she was sitting in the parlour, because the red firelight fell out through the window, and made a bright patch that we see before we see the house itself properly; and we went, as I say, quietly in through the back; and in the kitchen I said, 'Oh, let me tell her, for what she said to me.'
And I was sorry the minute I'd said it, when I see the way that clergyman from London looked at me; and we all went up to the parlour door, and Harry opened it as was his right.
There was Mrs. Blake sitting in front of the fire. She had got on her widow's mourning, very smart and complete, with black crape, and her white cap; and she'd got the front of her dress folded back very neat on her lap, and was toasting her legs, in her black-and-red checked petticoat, and her feet in cashmere house-boots, very warm and cosy, on the brass fender; and she had got port wine and sherry wine in the two decanters that was never out of the glass-fronted chiffonier when master was alive; and there was something else in a black bottle; and opposite her, in the best arm-chair that old master had sat in to the last, was that lawyer, Sigglesfield from Lewes. And when we all came in, one after another, rather slow, and bringing the cold air with us, they sat in their chairs as if they had been struck, and looked at us.
Harry and John was in front, as was right; and in the dusk they could hardly see who was behind.
'And what do you want, young men?' says Mrs. Blake, standing up in her crape, and her white cap, and looking very handsome, Harry said afterwards, though, for my part, I never could see it; and, as she stood up, she caught sight of the clergyman from London, and she shrank back into her chair and covered her face with her hands; and the clergyman stepped into the room, none of us having the least idea of what he was going to say, and said he—
'That's the woman that I married on the 7th; and that's the man I married her to!' said he, pointing to Sigglesfield, who seemed to turn twice as small, and his ferret eyes no better than button-hole slits.
'That!' said our parson; 'why, that's Mr. Sigglesfield, the solicitor from Lewes.'
'Then the lady opposite is Mrs. Sigglesfield, that's all,' said the parson from London.