ONE:
TWO:"She! noshe w?an't git me."Of course, he had been rashhe saw now that he had been a fool to speculate with the future. But who could have foretold that heir of Lardner's?no one had ever heard of him in Peasmarsh, and most people were as astonished as Reuben though not so disgusted. Sometimes he had an uneasy feeling that Lardner himself had not thought much about his distant son till a year or two ago. He remembered how the old man had disapproved of the way Rose's settlements were spent, and horrible conjectures would assail him that some earlier will had been revoked, and Rose disinherited because her[Pg 278] uncle did not wish to put more money into her husband's pocket.
THREE:There lived, at this time, at the distance of nearly a mile beyond the town, a man named Giles Gray; and about ten years previous to the time of which we write, there were few round Winchcombe of whom it might with more reason be imagined that his days would pass amidst peace and plenty. Possessed of a farm, which, if not the most extensive in the parish, was well cultivated and fruitful, and sufficiently ample to place him among the class of respectable yeoman; with a little gentle wife, two fine rosy children, and an exuberance of animal spirits, he seemed placed above the chances of fortune. But his wife fell into a consumptive illness, which, rendering her incapable of attending to the domestic affairs, her sister, a pretty, active, young woman, kindly left her home, at Campden, to take charge of the family. In less than a twelve-month the wife died, and Jane, the sister, still continued to superintend, and much was she praised for her management and for the attention she paid the little orphans. However, many months had not elapsed, ere strange whisperings went through the neighbourhood;groups might be seen conversing earnestly together;and, if it chanced that Gray's sister-in-law passed, every eye was turned up, and every head significantly shook, and Gray was at length compelled, in vindication of Jane, to produce a certificate, setting forth that they were married at St. Crypt's Church, in the city of Gloucester, about six months previously.
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