The candlestick was not more
innocent of all unpleasant feeling upon the subject than at that moment
was Dirty Davy.
Dirty Davy had brought with him his chief clerk, who was a facetious
personage, and boozy, and on the confidential footing of a common
rascality with his master, who, after the fashion of Harry V. in his
nonage, condescended in his frolics and his cups to men of low estate;
and Mary Matchwell, though fierce and deep enough, was not averse on
occasion, to partake of a bowl of punch in sardonic riot, with such
agreeable company.
Charles Nutter's unexpected coming to life no more affected Mary
Matchwell's claim than his supposed death did her spirits. Widow or
wife, she was resolved to make good her position, and the only thing she
seriously dreaded was that an intelligent jury, an eminent judge, and an
adroit hangman, might remove him prematurely from the sphere of his
conjugal duties, and forfeit his worldly goods to the crown.
Next morning, however, a writ or a process of some sort, from which
great things were expected, was to issue from the court in which her
rights were being vindicated.
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