He was growing old, she thought
older even in looks and feelings than in years, and she would make him
happy and comfortable in his declining years if he would but come and
pass them under her care. The addition which Mr. Ness's bequest made to
her income would enable her to do not only this, but to relieve Miss
Monro of her occupation of teaching; which, at the years she had arrived
at, was becoming burdensome. When she proposed the removal to Dixon he
shook his head.
"It's not that I don't thank you, and kindly, too; but I'm too old to go
chopping and changing."
"But it would be no change to come back to me, Dixon," said Ellinor.
"Yes, it would. I were born i' Hamley, and it's i' Hamley I reckon to
die."
On her urging him a little more, it came out that he had a strong feeling
that if he did not watch the spot where the dead man lay buried, the
whole would be discovered; and that this dread of his had often poisoned
the pleasure of his visit to East Chester.
"I don't rightly know how it is, for I sometimes think if it wasn't for
you, missy, I should be glad to have made it all clear before I go; and
yet at times I dream, or it comes into my head as I lie awake with the
rheumatics, that some one is there, digging; or that I hear 'em cutting
down the tree; and then I get up and look out of the loft window--you'll
mind the window over the stables, as looks into the garden, all covered
over wi' the leaves of the jargonelle pear-tree? That were my room when
first I come as stable-boy, and tho' Mr.
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