"Humbug and trash! You'll be the first to laugh and crack your jokes and all the rest of it, the day that girl marries. And the bell clashing overhead, and the ashes of him in the ground under. Let me choose the man--let me choose the man when she takes a husband!" Nathan perceived that his brother did not know the truth. It was no moment to speak of Cora and Ned Baskerville, however. "I've just come from the inquest," he said. "Of course 'twas brought in 'unsound mind.'" "Of course--instead of seeing and owning that the only flash of sanity in many a life be the resolve and deed to leave it. He was sane enough. No Baskerville was ever otherwise. 'Tis only us old fools, that stop here fumbling at the knot, that be mad. The big spirits can't wait to be troubled for threescore years and ten with a cargo of stinking flesh. They drop it overboard and----" His foot slipped and interrupted the sentence. "Take my arm," said the innkeeper. "I've told Gollop that Mark will lie with his mother." The other seemed suddenly moved by this news. "If I've misjudged you, Nathan, I'm sorry for it," he said. "You know in your heart whether you're as good as the folk think; and as wise; and as worthy. But you catch me short of sleep to-day; and when I'm short of sleep, I'm short of sense, perhaps. To lie with his mother--eh? No new thing if he does. He lay many a night under her bosom afore he was born, and many a night on it afterwards. She was wonderful wrapped up in him--the only thing she fretted to leave. How she would nuzzle him, for pure animal love, when he was a babby--like a cat and her kitten." "He promised her when he was ten years old--the year she died--that he would be buried with her," said Nathan. "I happen to know that, Humphrey." "Few keep their promises to the dead; but he's dead himself now. Burrow down--burrow down to her and put him there beside her--dust to dust. I take no stock in dust of any sort--not being a farmer. But his mother earned heaven, and if he didn't, her tears may float him in. To have bred an immortal soul, mark you, is something, even if it gets itself damned. The parent of a human creature be like God, for he's had a hand in the making of an angel or a devil." "Shall we bring Mark back to-night, or shall the funeral start from the church?" asked Nathan. They had now descended the hill and stood at Humphrey's gate. "Don't worry his bones. Let him stop where he is till his bed's ready. I'm not coming to the funeral." "Not coming!" "No. I didn't go to my wife's, did I?" "Yes, indeed you did, Humphrey."