After breakfast, she resolved to speak to her father, about the
funeral. He shook his head, and assented to all she proposed,
though many of her propositions absolutely contradicted one
another. Margaret gained no real decision from him; and was
leaving the room languidly, to have a consultation with Dixon,
when Mr. Hale motioned her back to his side.
'Ask Mr. Bell,' said he in a hollow voice.
'Mr. Bell!' said she, a little surprised. 'Mr. Bell of Oxford?' 'Mr. Bell,' he repeated. 'Yes. He was my groom's-man.' Margaret understood the association.
'I will write to-day,' said she. He sank again into listlessness.
All morning she toiled on, longing for rest, but in a continual
whirl of melancholy business.
Towards evening, Dixon said to her: 'I've done it, miss. I was really afraid for master, that he'd
have a stroke with grief. He's been all this day with poor
missus; and when I've listened at the door, I've heard him
talking to her, and talking to her, as if she was alive. When I
went in he would be quite quiet, but all in a maze like. So I
thought to myself, he ought to be roused; and if it gives him a
shock at first, it will, maybe, be the better afterwards. So I've
been and told him, that I don't think it's safe for Master
Frederick to be here. And I don't. It was only on Tuesday, when I
was out, that I met-a Southampton man--the first I've seen since
I came to Milton; they don't make their way much up here, I
think. Well, it was young Leonards, old Leonards the draper's
son, as great a scamp as ever lived--who plagued his father
almost to death, and then ran off to sea. I never could abide
him. He was in the Orion at the same time as Master Frederick, I
know; though I don't recollect if he was there at the mutiny.' 'Did he know you?' said Margaret, eagerly.
'Why, that's the worst of it. I don't believe he would have known
me but for my being such a fool as to call out his name. He were
a Southampton man, in a strange place, or else I should never
have been so ready to call cousins with him, a nasty,
good-for-nothing fellow. Says he, "Miss Dixon! who would ha'
thought of seeing you here? But perhaps I mistake, and you're
Miss Dixon no longer?" So I told him he might still address me as
an unmarried lady, though if I hadn't been so particular, I'd had
good chances of matrimony. He was polite enough: "He couldn't
look at me and doubt me." But I were not to be caught with such
chaff from such a fellow as him, and so I told him; and, by way
of being even, I asked him after his father (who I knew had
turned him out of doors), as if they was the best friends as ever
was. So then, to spite me--for you see we were getting savage,
for all we were so civil to each other--he began to inquire after
Master Frederick, and said, what a scrape he'd got into (as if
Master Frederick's scrapes would ever wash George Leonards'
white, or make 'em look otherwise than nasty, dirty black), and
how he'd be hung for mutiny if ever he were caught, and how a
hundred pound reward had been offered for catching him, and what
a disgrace he had been to his family--all to spite me, you see,
my dear, because before now I've helped old Mr. Leonards to give
George a good rating, down in Southampton. So I said, there were
other families be thankful if they could think they were earning
an honest living as I knew, who had far more cause to blush for
their sons, and to far away from home. To which he made answer,
like the impudent chap he is, that he were in a confidential
situation, and if I knew of any young man who had been so
unfortunate as to lead vicious courses, and wanted to turn
steady, he'd have no objection to lend him his patronage. He,
indeed! Why, he'd corrupt a saint. I've not felt so bad myself
for years as when I were standing talking to him the other day. I
could have cried to think I couldn't spite him better, for he
kept smiling in my face, as if he took all my compliments for
earnest; and I couldn't see that he minded what I said in the
least, while I was mad with all his speeches.' 'But you did not tell him anything about us--about Frederick?' 'Not I,' said Dixon. 'He had never the grace to ask where I was
staying; and I shouldn't have told him if he had asked. Nor did I
ask him what his precious situation was. He was waiting for a
bus, and just then it drove up, and he hailed it. But, to plague
me to the last, he turned back before he got in, and said, "If
you can help me to trap Lieutenant Hale, Miss Dixon, we'll go
partners in the reward. I know you'd like to be my partner, now
wouldn't you? Don't be shy, but say yes." And he jumped on the
bus, and I saw his ugly face leering at me with a wicked smile to
think how he'd had the last word of plaguing.' Margaret was made very uncomfortable by this account of Dixon's.