“Because you, sir, when ye were a-putting on the roof, only used to cuss in your mind, which is, I suppose, no harm at all.”
“I don’t think you know what goes on in my mind, Worm.”
“Oh, doan’t I, sir—hee, hee! Maybe I’m but a poor wambling thing, sir, and can’t read much; but I can spell as well as some here and there. Doan’t ye mind, sir, that blustrous night when ye asked me to hold the candle to ye in yer workshop, when you were making a new chair for the chancel?”
“Yes; what of that?”
“I stood with the candle, and you said you liked company, if ’twas only a dog or cat—maning me; and the chair wouldn’t do nohow.”
“Ah, I remember.”
“No; the chair wouldn’t do nohow. ’A was very well to look at; but, Lord!——”
“Worm, how often have I corrected you for irreverent speaking?”
“—’A was very well to look at, but you couldn’t sit in the chair nohow. ’Twas all a-twist wi’ the chair, like the letter Z, directly you sat down upon the chair. ‘Get up, Worm,’ says you, when you seed the chair go all a-sway wi’ me. Up you took the chair, and flung en like fire and brimstone to t’other end of your shop—all in a passion. ‘Damn the chair!’ says I. ‘Just what I was thinking,’ says you, sir. ‘I could see it in your face, sir,’ says I, ‘and I hope you and God will forgi’e me for saying what you wouldn’t.’ To save your life you couldn’t help laughing, sir, at a poor wambler reading your thoughts so plain. Ay, I’m as wise as one here and there.”
“I thought you had better have a practical man to go over the church and tower with you,” Mr. Swancourt said to Stephen the following morning, “so I got Lord Luxellian’s permission to send for a man when you came. I told him to be there at ten o’clock. He’s a very intelligent man, and he will tell you all you want to know about the state of the walls. His name is John Smith.”