“Certainly not!” answered Barbara with indignation.
“Then why should I be?” pursued the parson. “What is it to me? I am not a county-magistrate even!”
“I cannot understand you, Mr. Wingfold!” protested Barbara, “You say you are there not for yourself but for the people, yet you will not move to see right done!”
“I would move a long way to see that Mr. Tuke cared to do right: that is my business. It is not much to me, and nothing to my business, whether Mr. Tuke be rich or poor, a baronet or a bookbinder; it is everything to me whether Mr. Tuke will be an honest fellow or not.”
“But if he should prove to have a right to the property?”
“Then he ought to have the property. But it is not my business to discover or to enforce the right. My business is to help the young man to make little of the matter, whether he find himself the lawful heir, or a much injured man through his deceived mother.—Tell me whose servant I am.”
“You are the servant of Jesus Christ.”
“—Who said the servant must be as his master.—Do you remember how he did when a man came asking him to see justice done between him and his brother?—He said, 'Man, who made me a judge and a divider over you? Take heed and beware of covetousness.'—It may be your business to see about it; I don't know; I scarcely think it is. My advice would be to keep quiet yet a while, and see what will come. There appears no occasion for hurry. The universe does not hang on the question of Richard's rights. Will it be much whether your friend go into the other world as late heir, or even late owner of Mortgrange, or as the son of Tuke, the bookbinder? Will the dead be moved from beneath to meet the young baronet at his coming? Will the bookbinder go out into dry places, seeking rest and finding none?”