“That is easily said,” the merchant answered. “Robbery! whom has he robbed?”
Phœbe shuddered at the emphasis in the latter sentence, which convinced her that her father’s opinion of Richard was sealed and settled.
“His prosecutor is a person named Gibbs—Shuffleton Gibbs,” said Phœbe.
“The greatest scoundrel in London,” said the merchant. “Better to have such a man against you than for you; he is the intimate and bosom friend of your brother. Give me the paper, love, and leave me to read it.”
Phœbe opened out the paper which lay upon the table, kissed her father’s forehead, and went to comfort the Somertons.
She looked the very impersonation of comfort and consolation, this gentle, confiding, Miranda-like being, as she quietly glided across the park towards the farm. An old shepherd dog came bounding up to her, and leaping for joy, in its half-blind, shambling fashion; a little group of deer trotted off before her, but turned round to look, and said as plainly as could be, “We should not have moved, had it not been for that villainous dog;” ducks, and hens, and chickens, all came round about her as she entered the farm enclosure; a great furry cat came and purred beside her; and Mr. Somerton’s blackbird, which hung by the window in a wicker cage, began to sing so merrily that you could hardly hear the whirr and rattle of the threshing-machine, which was hard at work in the adjacent stack-yard.
Whilst Amy Somerton was pacing to and fro in her chamber at the Hall, Phœbe Tallant fulfilled her office at the Hall Farm, and endeavoured in a hundred gentle, gracious ways to console the bailiff and his wife. So far as Luke was concerned, she was not unsuccessful, but Mrs. Somerton gave way to her feelings without the slightest regard to Amy’s consolatory observations.
The farmer’s wife seemed to arraign all humanity as if it were in a conspiracy against her, and she was almost rude to Miss Tallant, so much so that Luke interposed in an authoritative manner, and Phœbe looked hurt and concerned.
This only changed the manner of Mrs. Somerton’s complainings. She was satisfied that Paul was guilty. He must have stolen the purse; it didn’t often happen, she went on, that people got charged with offences of that kind unless they deserved it. All her children went wrong; none of them cared for her; none of them made any return to her for all her care.
Nobody knew her trials, nobody could understand her troubles; all she hoped was, that the time would come soon, when they would be ended for ever.