A DARK NIGHT'S WORK
by Elizabeth Gaskell


CHAPTER I.


In the county town of a certain shire there lived (about forty years ago)
one Mr. Wilkins, a conveyancing attorney of considerable standing.

The certain shire was but a small county, and the principal town in it
contained only about four thousand inhabitants; so in saying that Mr.
Wilkins was the principal lawyer in Hamley, I say very little, unless I
add that he transacted all the legal business of the gentry for twenty
miles round. His grandfather had established the connection; his father
had consolidated and strengthened it, and, indeed, by his wise and
upright conduct, as well as by his professional skill, had obtained for
himself the position of confidential friend to many of the surrounding
families of distinction. He visited among them in a way which no mere
lawyer had ever done before; dined at their tables--he alone, not
accompanied by his wife, be it observed; rode to the meet occasionally as
if by accident, although he was as well mounted as any squire among them,
and was often persuaded (after a little coquetting about "professional
engagements," and "being wanted at the office") to have a run with his
clients; nay, once or twice he forgot his usual caution, was first in at
the death, and rode home with the brush. But in general he knew his
place; as his place was held to be in that aristocratic county, and in
those days. Nor let be supposed that he was in any way a toadeater. He
respected himself too much for that. He would give the most unpalatable
advice, if need were; would counsel an unsparing reduction of expenditure