He stood some moments in deliberation, and then he says, with a certain dignity unusual to him, “I will go.”  Then he casts his eye slowly round the room, with a lingering regard for his piles of documents and precious boxes of title deeds, as if he were bidding a last farewell to all that was dear to him on earth, and grotesque as his appearance might be, there was yet something pathetic in it.  But even at this moment his ruling passion prevailed.

“There is no need,” says he, “to burst these goodly locks by force.  I do bethink me the keys are here” (opening a drawer, and laying them upon the table).  Then dropping his head, he goes slowly to the door, but there he turns, lifting his head and fixing his rheumy eyes on Moll.  “I will take nothing from this house, not even the chattels that belong to me, bought from the mean wage I have allowed myself.  So shalt thou judge of my honesty.  They shall stand here till I return, for that I shall return I am as fully persuaded as that a just God doth dispose of his creatures.  Thee hast might on thy side, woman, but whether thee hast right as well, shall yet be proven—­not by the laws of man, which are an invention of the devil to fatten rogues upon the substance of fools, but by the law of Heaven, to which I do appeal with all my soul” (lifting high his shaking hands).  “Morning and night I will pray that God shall smite with heavy hand which of us two hath most wronged the other.  Offer the same prayer if thee darest.”

I do confess that this parting shot went home to my conscience, and troubled my mind considerably; for feeling that he was in the right of it as regarded our relative honesty, I was constrained to think that his prophecy might come true also to our shame and undoing.  But Moll was afflicted with no such qualms, her spirit being very combative and high, and her conscience (such as it was) being hardened by our late discussion to resist sharper slaps than this.  Nay, maintaining that Simon must be dishonest by the proof we had of his hypocrisy and double dealing, she would have me enter upon my office at once by sending letters to all her tenants, warning them to pay no rent to any one lately in her service, but only to me; and these letters (which kept my pen going all that afternoon) she signed with the name of Judith Godwin, which seemed to me a very bold, dangerous piece of business; but she would have it so, and did her signature with a strong hand and a flourish of loops beneath like any queen.

Nor was this all; for the next morning she would have me go to that Mr. Goodman, who had offered to buy her farm for ready money, and get what I could from him, seeing that she must furnish herself with fresh gowns and make other outlay for her coming marriage.  So to him I go, and after much haggling (having learnt from Simon that the land was worth more than he offered for it), I brought him to give six thousand pounds instead of five, and this was clearly better business on his side than on mine at that, for that the bargain might not slip from his hands he would have me take three thousand pounds down as a handsell, leaving the rest to be paid when the deed of transference was drawn up.