A Maggot - John Fowles (34 page)

Q. I know thy friendship and thy religion, Jones. The
first is all treason, the second all dissent. You are a plague among
the decency of nations. A nauseous boil upon this kingdom's arse, may
God forgive you.

A. At times, sir. When we know no better.

Q. Which is all times. Spake she more of his
Lordship?

A. That she forgave him, sir, tho' God would not.

Q. What right has a brazen strumpet to forgive her
masters and to know God's will?

A. None, sir. I walked almost sleeping, I was so
tired and footsore. And what with all that had passed that day, I was
much confused. It seemed somewhat of truth, as I led her.

Q. She led thee, thou wretch. She rode the horse?

A. Yes, sir. And here and there walked a little, to
give me rest.

Q. Wast thou so fatigued thou no longer played the
gallant? Why, hast lost thy tongue?

A. Well, your worship, I see I must tell all, tho'
'tis nothing to your purpose. When we rested before Bideford, she was
cold and lay beside me on the bank, with her back turned, 'twas but
for the warmth, and saying she trusted me to take no advantage. Which
I did not, yet told her as we lay, which is truth, I had married
once, albeit it turned out ill for my own fault in drinking and my
poor wife that died of the flux. And that I was no better than I
should be and doubtless a poor figure of a man beside many she had
known. Yet if she would take me, I would take her, and marry again,
and we might live honestly and as she said she now wished.

Q. What, she lies with Satan in the morning and thou
wouldst lie with her in the evening?

A. Sir, she had lain with Christ since then, or so
she said.

Q. Thou gav'st lease to such blasphemy!

A. No, sir. I believed her truly repentant.

Q. And ripe for the practice of thy lust.

A. Well, sir, I won't deny I envied Dick his use of
her before. I have my natural vigours. I liked her much for her new .
candour, sir, as well as her flesh. And thought she might

bring me to better ways, if I married her.

Q. But this new-found saint would have none of thee?

A. That she'd have none of being wedded to any man,
sir. For she said I was kind to think of taking to wife one as
defiled and sinful as she, for which she was grateful, tho' she could
not; seeing she had promised at the worst of her trial inside the
cavern, that she should never again have knowledge of any man of her
own willing.

Q. That sufficed thee, for an answer?

A. Sir, I tried again on her going the next day -
later that same, rather. And she said, I was a good man, she would
entertain well of my offer if she changed her mind. Yet had no
present desire that she should, indeed earnestly the contrary. And in
all case first she must see her parents.

Q. Thou shouldst have unfrocked her piety whilst thou
hadst the chance.

A. That tide is lost, sir.

Q. But I shall catch it. She'll not candour me with
her soft looks and ranting fits. Quakery, quackery, by Heaven she
won't.

A. No, sir. And I wish you well in it.

Q. I need no wishes from such as thee.

A. My pardon, sir.

Q. Jones, if thou'st lied in any particular of this.
I'll have thee at a rope's end yet, I warrant thee that.

A. Yes, sir. I know it well. I wish I had told you
all in the first place.

Q. Thou art too much a dolt and braggart to be a
thorough rogue. That is all the good in thee, which is none, but by
degree of wrongdoing. Now be off, until my further disposition. I
have not released thee yet. Thy lodging is paid, and to it I sentence
thee until all is done. It is clear?

A. Yes, sir. I thank your
worship humbly. God bless your worship.

* * *

The 11th Sept. Lincoln's Inn.

Your Grace,

My most humble concern for Yr Grace would, were I not
also his servant, with duty above all else to bow to his gracious
commands, beseech me to forbear the dispatch of this that is
inclosed. Would that I might find some allay to it, yet cannot beyond
that ancient saw of my calling, Testis unus, testis nullus. The more
might it be applied to this present, that the one witness is known
liar and transparent rogue, and here does report of another we may
fear to be a greater liar still. Yet must I in truth to Yr Grace
state that though in all Jones doth most plainly merit the rope, I
believe him no liar in the substance of our matter. Our hope and
prayer must lie therefore in that the wench did cunningly deceive
him.

All is on foot to discover her, and God willing we
shall. Then shall she have such a riding as Yr Grace may guess. The
rogue Jones describes himself in all he says, Yr Grace may picture
his kind, that matches all that is worst, which is much, in his
wretched nation. He is man of clouts. I will venture one hundred
pound to a peppercorn he hath been no nearer Mars or my lady Bellona
than John o' Groats is to Rome, nay, further still. He is far more a
frighted eel, that would slip from any pot, once caught.

This also I beg to submit to Yr Grace, that knows his
Lordship and that all in which he standeth blameable. There is alas
no doubt that he is guilty of the most heinous of familial sins, in
his conduct towards Yr Grace's wishes; yet always with this in his
favour, as Yr Grace himself once in happier days remarked, that he
hath seemed unsullied by those nowaday too frequent vices of his age
and station; that is, by none so foul and dark as is now proposed. Yr
Grace, I may believe gentlemen exist that would sink to such
depravity; but not a one bearing the honour to be Yr

Grace's son. Nor will my reason believe, as I doubt
not Yr Grace's likewise, that such witches as these have been, these
last hundred years. In short, I must exhort Yr Grace to patience. I
pray he win' not credit that such alleged infamy as here I send
report of to hire is yet determined truth.

Yr Grace's most saddened, and ever his most obedient

Henry Ayscough

* * *

Bristol, by Froomgate.

Wednesday, the 15th of September, 1736

Sir,

I have received the honour of your letter and return
your kind compliments an hundredfold, to which I trust I may add that
your most noble client may be assured that I am ever his to command
in anything that concerns him. I count myself no less fortunate to
have been able to assist a gentleman of your eminence in our
profession in the business of last year; as to which I may mention
that I have just recently been at Assize (in another happily
concluded suit) before Mr Justice G-y and that he did me the honour
of asking me in private to convey his respects to our client and
assurance of his most favourable interest in any further cause Sir
Charles may choose to pursue before him; the which compliment, my
dear sir, I felt gratefully obliged to transmit to you before I come
to your directions in this present most sad and delicate matter.

Sir, you may furthermore assure His Grace that
nothing is more precious to me than the good name of our nobility,
that pre-eminent and divinely chosen bulwark upon which, conjoined to
the King's majesty, the safety and welfare of our nation must always
most depend; and that all shall be conducted with the utmost secrecy,
as you request.

The particular you seek I have had most closely
inquired after, and find she appeared in this city - and in that
place she stated - about the time conjectured in your letter, though
none my searcher spoke to could put more precise date upon it than
the first or second week of May Last. She was told what is truth,
viz. that her parents are gone this three years since to another
meeting of their sect, it is believed in Manchester, and reside here
no more. It doth appear that in Manchester a brother to her father
dwells, who had persuaded them of better living (and a more
pernicious enthusiasm besides, I doubt not) to be found there, and so
they did take their three other children with them, thus leaving her
no relations in this city. These three are all daughters, there is no
brother.

The father's name is Amos Hocknell, his wife's is
Martha, who was Bradling or Bradlynch before marriage, and is
originary of Corsham, Co. Wilts. Hocknell was accounted here a good
carpenter and joiner, though adamant in his heresy. He was most
lately employed by Mr Alderman Diffrey, an excellent and Christian
merchant and master ship-builder of this city, for the cabin
furnishings of hiss vessels. I am acquainted with Mr Diffrey, and he
tells me he had no complaints of Hocknell for his work; but found he
could not leave his preaching and prophesying at home and was ever
trying to subvert those around him from established religion, to
which my worthy friend Mr D. is to his honour most securely attached;
and that on finding one day Hocknell had secretly won two of Mr D.'s
apprentices to his own false faith, he dismissed him; at which
Hocknell cried injustice and persecution, though Mr D. had warned him
many times he would not stand for what Hocknell had persisted in
doing, as was now well proven. The man is as turbulent and rabid in
his politics as his religion, Mr D.'s very words are these: as
steeped fn false liberty as a cod-barrel in salt, from which you may
judge his kind; and by this that Mr D. also told me, of how when he
dismissed Hocknell, he had the impertinence to exclaim, that any man
might hire his hands, but no man, not even the King, nor Parliament,
should ever hire his soul. It seems the fellow muttered for a time of
taking himself and his family to the American colonies (where I
heartily wish all such seditious fanatickals might be condemned), yet
thought the better of it. The conclusion is, he may be found
certainly by inquiry at the Manchester meeting-house; for 'tis, as
you must know better than I, sir, an inconsiderable town to this
great city that I write from.

The person stated she was come from London, and had
there been maid by her work, tho' said no name nor place that is now
remembered. To my best ascertaining she stayed no more than an hour
in a neighbour's house, who informed her of the above, and then
departed away saying she must journey on without delay to Manchester,
as she wished with all her heart to rejoin her parents. Sir, I must
explain that by a most malign mischance for our purpose, the
neighbour in question, an elderly Quakeress, is dead of a dropsy
three weeks before my receipt of your letter, and all is founded upon
her tattle to her gossips. 'Tis accordingly tongue-worn testimony,
yet I believe may be credited.

Of the person's past, my man could discover little
more, owing to the closeness of her obstinate co-religionaries in
this town, who deem all inquiry, however lawful, a threatened tyranny
upon them. Howsoever he found one to tell him the maid was commonly
considered slid from Quakerism, and lost to their faith and world,
after being discovered in sin, some five or six years past, with one
Henry Harvey, son of the house where first she had work here; was
cast out by her mistress, then by her parents, who considered her
insufficient in repentance; since it was she that led the young man
to their sin. And was long disappeared, none knew where till this
coming-back (of which none but the aforesaid neighbour knew nor spoke
to her before she was gone off again).

Lastly I must inform you we are not the first to
inquire after the person, for the prattler above told my searcher
another came asking this past June after her, saying he was from
London and had a message from her mistress; but neither his
appearance nor his manner recommended him to these jealous and
suspicious people, and he was told little beyond that she was
believed gone to Manchester; at which the fellow went off and has
troubled them no more. I trust you will know better what to make of
this than I, sir.

I write in some haste before I leave on the other
matter, which shall be done as prompt as circumstance allows. Pray
rest assured I will write to you thereon as soon as it shall be
possible. I am, sir, in all things your* noble and gracious client's
and your esteemed own most humble, most faithful and most obedient
servant,

Rich'd Pygge, attorney at
law

* * *

Bideford, the 20th of September.

Sir,

I have spent these two previous days at the very
place of your most concern, and write while all is fresh in mind.
This place is to my best computation two and a half miles above the
ford upon the Bideford road and the valley thereto is known as the
Cleeve, after its cleft and woody sides, that make it more ravine
than vale, like many in this country. The cavern lies with a sward
and drinking-pool for beasts before, in the upper part of a
side-valley to the aforesaid, the branch path to which is reached in
one and three quarter miles from the ford upon the high road. All is
desart in these parts, and the valley most seldom used unless by
shepherds to gain the moor above. One such, named James Lock, and his
boy, of the parish of Daccombe, was at the cavern when we came; as he
told us was his summer wont, for he has passed many such there. This
Mopsus appeared a plain fellow, no more lettered than his sheep, but
honest in his manner.