For it had contributed its quota to contemporary history; and what parish
can, after all, do more! Reporters pervaded it armed with note-books and
pencils. They put questions, politely requested a naming of names. The
information furnished in answer would reach the unassailable authority of
print, giving Deadham opportunity to read the complimentary truth about
itself. Still better, giving others opportunity to read the complimentary
truth about Deadham. Hence trade and traffic of sorts, with much
incidental replenishing of purses. Great are the uses of a dead prophet
to the keepers of his tomb! Not within the memory of the oldest
inhabitant had any funeral been so largely or honourably attended. Truly
it spelled excellent advertisement--and this although two persons,
calculated mightily to have heightened interest and brought up dramatic
and emotional values, were absent from the scene.
For Lesbia Faircloth, giving her barman and two women servants a holiday,
closed the inn at noon. Alone within the empty house, she locked the
outer doors.
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