To John Beacham, however, in his present mood of mind, his wife’s taciturnity was both perplexing and vexatious. Feeling well assured that the question of the journey to London was not by any means disposed of, he would have greatly preferred a present settlement of the difficulty, to the state of suspense which he feared would be, for some hours at least, his portion; it was therefore rather a relief than otherwise to him when Mrs. Beacham--who, to do her justice, seldom kept her fingers long out of the domestic pie--volunteered her opinion on the subject under discussion. “In course, John, you know your own affairs best,” she said, “and I make it a rule, and always have done, which those that knows me best can certify to, not to interfere in other people’s business. But if you’ll excuse me,” and the old lady smoothed her black-silk apron with an air of dignified humility, “if you’ll excuse me, I should venture to advise that Mrs. John may be allowed to go and see her father. I may be right and I may be wrong; but if he hasn’t his health, poor gentleman, he’s to be pitied; and them that has should give way a little, and meet him half-way, instead of standing out, which isn’t, in my opinion--but then I’m an old-fashioned body--altogether right. He’s Mrs. John’s father, you know, is the Colonel, though it isn’t often the poor gentleman gets spoken of in _this_ house; and blood’s thicker than water, and--” John interrupted this harangue with a gesture of impatience. “There, there, mother, that’ll do,” he said pettishly; “no need to hammer away so long on one subject. If the man that’s been a brute to Honor, and to her mother before her, is to have it all his own way, why let him; and--” How this worthy man, who with all his warmth and kindliness of heart had, as we know, a quick temper of his own, might have wound up the sentence had not his words been arrested by a sudden recollection of the respect due to his womankind, is best left to the imagination. With such a disposition and nature as this right-minded man possessed, even the most trivial of offences--offences, too, of which only his own conscience was the silent witness--were almost certain to be followed by the desire for expiation. No sooner, therefore, had the wish that condign punishment might follow on the Colonel’s misdeeds been suppressed, than he said in a gentler tone to Honor: “If you think your father has any claims upon you, my dear, why then you had better write and say to Mrs. Norcott that she may expect you up in London. As mother says, sick people have to be given way to. I don’t know much about bad health myself, thank God; but--No, don’t thank me--settle it your own way, and if you’re pleased I’m pleased;” and having so said, John went his way to his daily business on the farm.