Dicky's way of getting information seemed guileless, and Holgate opened
his basket as wide as he knew. "Toorn, didst tha sway" (Holgate talked
broadly to Dicky always, for Dicky had told him of his aunt, Lady
Carmichael, who lived near Halifax in Yorkshire), "toorn, aw warrant!
It be reg'lar as kitchen-fire, this Hasha business, for three years, ever
sin' aw been scrapin' mud o' Nile River."

"That was a nasty row they had over the cemetery three years ago, the
Governor against the lot, from mamour to wekeel!"

Holgate's eyes flashed, and he looked almost angrily down at Dicky, whose
hand was between the teeth of the playful Farshoot.

"Doost think--noa, tha canst not think that Goovnur be 'feared o' Hasha
fook. Thinks't tha, a man that told 'em all--a thousand therr--that he'd
hang on nearest tree the foorst that disobeyed him, thinks't tha that
Goovnur's lost his nerve by that?"

"The Governor never loses his nerve, Holgate," said Dicky, smiling and
offering a cigar. "There's such a thing as a man being afraid to trust
himself where he's been in a mess, lest he hit out, and doesn't want to."

Holgate, being excited, was in a fit state to tell the truth, if he knew
it; which was what Dicky had worked for; but Holgate only said:

"It bean't fear, and it bean't milk o' human kindness. It be soort o'
thing a man gets. Aw had it once i' Bradford, in Little Cornish Street.
Aw saw a faace look out o' window o' hoose by tinsmith's shop, an' that
faace was like hell's picture-aye, 'twas a killiagous faace that! Aw
never again could pass that house. 'Twas a woman's faace. Horrible