The Rev. Richard Stoyle Chowne had not—whatever his other vices were—one grain of pious hypocrisy in all his foul composition. If he had, he might have flourished, and with his native power, must have been one of the foremost men of this, or any other age. But his pride allowed him never to let in pretence religious into the texture of his ways. A worse man need not be desired: and yet he did abhor all cant, to such a degree that he made a mock of his own church-services.
"General, I have nought to say. You have asked this question more than once. You know what my opinion is."
"I know that you have the confidence, sir, every honourable man must have, in my poor son's innocence. You support it against every one."
"Against all the world: against even you, when you allow yourself to doubt it. Tush! I would not twice think of it. However many candles burn"—this was a touch of his nasty sarcasm, which he never could deny himself—"up and down the valley, General, no son of yours, however wild, and troubled in expenditure, could ever shape or even dream of anything dishonourable."
"I hope not—I hope to God, not," Sir Philip said, with a little gasp, as if he were fearing otherwise: "Dick, you are my godson, and you have been the greatest comfort to me; because you never would believe——"
"Not another word, General. You must not dwell on this matter so. The children were fine little dears of course, very clever and very precious——"
"Oh, if you only knew the words, Dick, my little granddaughter could come out with! Scarcely anything you could think of would have been too big for her little mouth. And if she could not do it once, she never left it till she did. Where it came from I could not tell, for we are not great at languages: but it must have been of her mother's race. And the boy, though not with gifts of that sort—oh, you ought to have seen his legs, Dick—at least till he took the whooping-cough!" The stately old gentleman leaned, and dropped a tear perhaps into the river Tawe.
"General, I understand it all," said Chowne, though he never had a child, by reason of the Almighty's mercy to the next generation: "of course these pretty children were a great delight to every one. But affairs of this sort happen in all ancient families. The mere extent of land appears to open for clandestine graves——"
"That wicked devilish story, Dick! Did you tell me, or did you not, to take it as the Fiend's own lie?"
"A lie, of course, as concerns the Captain: from their want of knowledge. But concerning some one else, true enough, I fear, I fear."