“You can, if you will only try. I believe in dreams—and I dreamt a week ago that Mary Monson would be acquitted. It would be ag’in all our new notions to hang so nice a lady.”
“Our tastes might take offence at it; and taste is of some influence yet, I am bound to agree with you.”
“But you do agree with me in the uselessness of hanging, when the object is to reform?”
“Unfortunately for the force of that argument, my dear landlady, society does not punish for the purposes of reformation—that is a very common blunder of superficial philanthropists.”
“Not for the purposes of reformation, ’Squire!—You astonish me! Why, for what else should it punish?”
“For its own protection. To prevent others from committing murder. Have you no other reason than your dream, my good Mrs. Horton, for thinking Mary Monson will be acquitted?”
The woman put on a knowing look, and nodded her head significantly. At the same time, she glanced towards the counsellor’s companions, as much as to say that their presence prevented her being more explicit.
“Ned, do me the favour to go to your wife, and tell her I shall stop in, and say a kind word as I pass her door;—and, Jack, go and bid Sarah be in Mrs. McBrain’s parlour, ready to give me my morning’s kiss.”
The Doctor and John complied, leaving Dunscomb alone with the woman.
“May I repeat the question, my good landlady?—Why do you think Mary Monson is to be acquitted?” asked Dunscomb, in one of his softest tones.